State Champ
“Ferocious, hilarious, slippery, and wise” (Leni Zumas)—a protest novel for our times.
A high-school state champion runner turned college dropout, Angela is working as a receptionist at an abortion clinic when a “heartbeat law” criminalizes most abortions statewide. In the ensuing upheaval, her boss is arrested for providing illegal procedures and the clinic is shut down.
Angela has never been either an activist or a model employee. But she gets why her boss didn't follow the rules. She decides to go on a hunger strike in the boarded-up clinic, to protest her boss's arrest and everything that's been lost. She'll draw on her skillset: the masochistic discipline of a runner, a history of self-destructive behavior, and a willingness to sleep on exam room tables (whose hygienic paper she uses as her diary).
Angela's protest is solitary, enraged, and a little messy, but it mobilizes a group of people around her-an ex who's a local journalist looking for a good story, the everyday people the clinic once served, and most especially a formidable anti-abortion activist named Janine.
Lucid, strange, and deeply metal, State Champ cuts through the political rhetoric to explore the relationship between bodily autonomy and real freedom. Angela's story is about what abortion access means day-to-day and how much we are-in ways that can transform us-responsible for one another.
These discussion questions were provided by the publisher, Bloomsbury Publishing.
Book club questions for State Champ by Hilary Plum
Use these discussion questions to guide your next book club meeting.
How did the scenes with Janine make you feel? Do you think Janine cares for the Roses of the world, truly? Why or why not?
What do you think motivated Dr. Park to check on Angela? Do you think she was sympathetic to Angela’s protest?
Who do you think lit the match that eventually burned down the clinic? Could it have truly been someone who cared about Angela or did she just need to believe that it was?
Why do you think the novel ends with the scene of Angela running, being tailed by her mom’s car?
Why do you think Angela decided to protest the clinic’s closure with a hunger strike? Do you think her tactic was ever going to be effective? Did she care if it was going to be effective or not?
What do you think Angela means by “You have to find someone who understands how things work in this other place. This is why we all feel like totally helpless when we see doctors, and we think they’re so amazing or evil. Because most of our life
happens somewhere we can barely get to and don’t understand.” Have you had an experience with health care that made you feel a similar way?
Why do you think Angela was attracted to the senator’s aide? Do you think there’s a chance that it was, in fact, her comment that led to the raid?
Though not always spoken, care is a central theme in the novel. There are ideas about who is deserving of care and who isn’t. What does this theme of care and caregiving bring up for you?
Being the “State Champ” is central to Angela’s own story, but she also distances herself from the achievement. How does Angela’s experience of winning her race define her? How doesn’t it?
What do you make of Angela’s aunt? Did they have a healthy relationship? Do you think her aunt wanted to help after the suicide of Angela’s mother?
As the hunger strike continues, Angela becomes a less conventional narrator; the prose becomes murkier and more slippery. Do you think this technique was an effective tool for telling the story? Why or why not?
Later in the novel, Angela reveals that an eating disorder ended her running career. How do you think this relates to her hunger strike? When is starvation an effective tool of protest or civil disobedience? In Angela’s case, is it a manifestation of her disordered eating? Can it be both?
State Champ Book Club Questions PDF
Click here for a printable PDF of the State Champ discussion questions