Great novels speak to us. What if, all this time, they were waiting for us to respond?
Meet Author Asks, the conversation card game that transforms real questions from books into absorbing conversations.
Letter from the Editor
For the past few years, a lot of my work at Author & Co. has meant reading with very specific goals in mind, locating the strange and unexpected places literature enters daily life.
For Author Clock, I was looking for exact minutes of the day. For Author Forecast, I searched for descriptions of weather.
And lately, I’ve been looking for something new: questions!
Honestly, I thought the task would be easier...
There were days when I found myself searching every question in a book and still not finding one that worked for the game.
Some were too tied to plot. Some needed the whole scene around them. Others were questions only in the grammatical sense: “Hello?” “Would you like tea?” “Where are you going?”
The best questions would need to leave the book and still feel worth answering.
When one worked, I usually knew it right away. It had the exact feeling I was looking for: literary, and a bit irresistible.
The idea for Author Asks came to the team as we were thinking about how literature might enter daily life in a more social way.
Our first two products, Author Clock and Author Forecast, are both, in a way, private experiences.
At home, I pass my Author Clock on my desk and catch a quote at 1:17 p.m., or look at Author Forecast and see the sunny day outside reframed through a passage from literature. I love reflecting on the current moment and my surroundings through literature as the day passes. But, like much of my reading, this is usually a solo activity.
Now, Author Asks brings literature into a conversation. A question is read aloud, and suddenly, the quote has company.
Author Asks includes 200 Question Cards, split into two decks: 100 Classic and 100 Contemporary. Each card includes the question, the author, and the book it came from. You can play with the decks separately or mix them together.
To start the game, a player draws a Question Card and reads it aloud. Everyone takes a turn answering. There are no wrong answers, just opportunities to start a conversation, tell a story, hear someone differently, or get to know a friend on a deeper level.
The game also includes 10 Character Cards, which add a “plot twist” to the round. You might answer as The Poet, The Unreliable Narrator, or another literary persona when the table needs more drama, humor, or a new direction.
One of my favorite elements of the final version is the packaging.
The box looks like a book, so it can sit on a bookshelf with the novels, stories, and authors that inspired it. Inside are the Classic and Contemporary decks, along with the Character Cards and the white oak stand.
Oh, and how could I forget? The white oak stand is an especially nice touch because it has two purposes.
During gameplay, it holds one question upright, elevating the card being played.
And between games, the stand gives the question an opportunity to have another life.
If you’re particularly enchanted by a quote, any Question Card can be displayed on a desk, a coffee table, a nightstand, or a bookshelf, like a sentence you haven’t finished answering yet.
One of my favorite Question Cards is from Murakami’s The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle.
He asks, “Is it possible, finally, for one human being to achieve perfect understanding of another?”
So, what do you think?
Let’s play a round of Author Asks and find out.
-Yasmin
We’re bringing literature to daily life in wonderfully unexpected ways.
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Yasmin is Head of Content & Community, where she curates the quote libraries for all Author & Co. products. .
At Author & Co., we combine design, function, and our love of reading to create tools that bring literature into your everyday life.
Learn more at authorandco.com
For inquiries about Author Asks, please email us at info@authorandco.com