Discover dozens of hand-crafted Hello Beautiful book club questions here. This stunning Oprah’s book club pick and soaring family drama book is one for the ages. You’ll foster meaningful discussion and get free printable book club questions to use as a book club resource at your in-person meeting. Let’s get literary!
Quick Hello Beautiful Summary With Themes
- Instant New York Times bestseller with one million copies sold
- A best book of the year by The Washington Post, Time, Harper’s Bazaar
- The Literary Lifestyle’s best book of the year
Beginning in 1960 Boston, in Hello Beautiful by Ann Napolitano (author of Dear Edward), William Waters is a young man whose upper-middle-class family experienced a tragedy that made it hard for his parents to nurture and love him growing up. Instead, he found a home in the sport of basketball. As a college history student and basketball player in Chicago, he met and began to date a fellow student named Julia Padavano. He also begins writing a book about the history of basketball.
Julia is confident and sure of herself and her future. Her life has been carefully planned and executed. She’s the oldest of four sisters in a middle-class Italian American Chicagoan family, who often refer to themselves as the sisters in Little Women.
Her younger sister, Sylvie, is also a young woman, and she’s very bookish and romantic. And twins Emmeline, the caretaker, and Cecelia, the artist, are teens. Their mother, Rose, is a quirky gardener who can be stubborn and hard-headed. Father, Charlie, is a poetry lover who works in a paper factory and makes an impact on those around him.
William finds himself a home amidst the loving, yet chaotic, Padavanos. Thus begins an epic, decades-long saga.
Hello Beautiful concludes with Alice visiting Chicago to connect with her long-lost family. William embraces her and his emotional healing, showing his emotional growth. They seek closure and connection after Sylvie’s untimely passing.
This is a great book club book for discussing such themes as family, love, trauma, mental health, grief, sisterhood, resilience, anger, forgiveness, and so much more. I recommend it to fans of Ask Again, Yes by Mary Beth Keane.
Watch Mary Beth Keane discuss this book with Oprah Winfrey on Youtube:
Reading Tip: While Hello Beautiful hearkens to Little Women, you need not read Little Women first. It is not a retelling, and there are many differences. Read more in my Hello Beautiful book review.
Ann Napolitano’s Hello Beautiful: Book Club Questions
These Hello Beautiful discussion questions are meant to help you explore the most interesting and prominent parts of the literary fiction book by Ann Napolitano, based on my reading notes.
Spoiler Alert: Be forewarned that, to do so in the most meaningful way, it’s necessary to incorporate many spoilers.
Discuss the significance of the title Hello Beautiful.
Discuss the significance of the book cover art.
Did you like the points of view by which this novel was presented?
The novel progresses slowly in time at the beginning and end, but fast in the middle. Did you enjoy this pacing?
Whose story was this, if any one character?
Were you familiar with Ann Napolitano’s writing before you read Hello Beautiful?
Were you familiar with Little Women before reading Hello Beautiful?
Compare and contrast Hello Beautiful to Little Women.
Did you like the explicit references to Little Women, or do you think they should have been more implicit?
Which Padavano was most like which March family member (in Little Women)?
Were the settings of Boston, New York, and Chicago significant, or could Hello Beautiful have taken place anywhere?
A lot happens in Hello Beautiful, but it’s technically a character-driven novel. Did it feel more character-driven or plot-driven to you?
Discuss the different parenting styles in Hello Beautiful.
Is it significant that Rose enjoyed gardening?
Was it significant that Charlie worked at a paper factory?
Why did William enjoy the physical game of basketball so much?
Why did William enjoy the intellectual side of basketball so much?
Did anything besides their obvious grief make William’s parents so incredibly distant?
Was William’s height significant or coincidental?
Why was William interested in history?
What attracted William and Julia to each other?
Were William and Julia a good match?
What made William like the Padavanos?
Discuss the significance of the Walt Whitman quote referenced multiple times in Hello Beautiful: “I … am not contain’d between my hat and boots[.]”
Were William and Julia too young to get married?
Why do you think William’s parents didn’t attend his wedding to Julia?
Why didn’t William cash his parents’ check?
How did William’s injuries impact his life?
Discuss how Cecelia’s pregnancy is revealed to each character.
Discuss the characters’ reactions to Cecelia’s pregnancy, including Cecelia’s reaction.
Did you find it significant that the youngest Padavano sister became a mother first?
Why did Julia get pregnant?
Discuss Rose’s beliefs surrounding young motherhood.
Discuss the significance of Charlie’s first words to Izzy.
Discuss the significance of Charlie’s final words.
What killed Charlie?
What impact did Charlie leave on the various members of his family?
Charlie’s funeral showed him to be a man of vast impact. Why was this so intriguing to William particularly?
Discuss how each character copes with grief.
Was Rose justified in her stubbornness towards Cecelia?
Why did Rose move?
Was Julia justified in letting Sylvie read William’s draft of his book?
How did pregnancy and parenthood change William’s and Julia’s marriage?
What held William back from connecting with Alice?
Should Sylvie have been living with William and Julia?
Arash notes to William that we hardly ever ask each other how we’ve been hurt. What do you make of this?
Are the Padavanos a happy family?
Why did Julia react to William being missing and hospitalized as she did?
Why did Sylvie initially search for and accompany William?
Discuss the significance of hospitals in the lives of the Padavano family.
Why was William so final in his decision to “give up” Alice?
Discuss the role of secrets in the Padavano family.
When do you think Sylvie fell in love with William?
Were you surprised by Emmeline’s revelation?
Were you surprised by how Rose reacted to the news of the separation and William’s hospitalization?
Discuss William’s various support systems and the impact they had.
Was Julia “running away” from her problems by going to New York?
Sylvie said she deserved William. Do you think she was right (literally and/or ethically)?
Did Sylvie betray Julia?
Was William Sylvie’s “one great love” or a “brutal choice” she made?
Discuss William’s career trajectory.
Discuss the role of religion and, particularly, “Catholic guilt” in the characters’ lives.
Did you find the length of the family rifts believable?
Describe Kent and his role in William’s life.
Discuss Julia’s and Sylvia’s secret meetings.
Was Julia justified in lying to Alice about William?
What do you make of how Julia revealed the truth about William to Alice?
Did Sylvie’s illness surprise you?
Compare and contrast Alice to her parents.
Why does Alice seek safety and security so intensely?
William remains the only man in the lives of the Padavano women for the long term. What do you make of this?
Discuss the theme of forgiveness and how it occurs in Hello Beautiful.
What do you make of William’s in-person reaction to Alice as an adult?
Discuss the role art plays in Hello Beautiful.
Discuss the quote: “Grief is love.”
Discuss the quote: “Forgiveness is [love] too.”
Charlie says, “Hello, beautiful,” to his daughters, and William says, “Hello,” to Alice. Is this significant or coincidental?
What does Hello Beautiful say about mental health?
Discuss William’s character arc throughout Hello Beautiful.
Will Sylvie’s book be published?
Printable PDF Reading Guide of the Discussion Questions
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Book Club Ideas for Food and Beyond
- Food: Chicago deep-dish pizza and Italian beef sandwiches
- Activities: basketball, painting
Book Club Books to Read Next
If your club loved these Hello Beautiful book club questions and wants a similar book to read next, check out these family dramas:
remember, it’s a good day to read a book. – jules
