Book Club Night Kit
Look What the Cat Dragged In
Jason Rekulak
Cozy night
A pet-sitting gig that should be the easiest job in the world turns quietly, deliciously wrong, and the illustrations scattered through the book give everyone something to pass around and gasp over. It is a creep-up-slowly thriller that still feels snug enough to read under a blanket.
Soup, Lamplight, and One Very Suspicious Cat
Come over for tomato soup, tuna melts, and hot cider while we talk about Jason Rekulak's Look What the Cat Dragged In. Bring your worst pet-sitting story and a blanket if you run cold.
Reading level: Easy
Best for: A club that likes a shiver but not a scar, and that happily talks about pets, old houses, and gut feelings before getting to the big stuff.
Discussion
Warm-up
- 1.Have you ever taken a job that sounded almost too easy (pet-sitting, house-sitting, watering someone's plants)? Tell us how it actually went.
- 2.Before we get into it: what is your relationship with cats? Are you charmed, suspicious, allergic, or fully devoted?
Digging in
- 1.When you got to the illustrations, what did you do with your body? Did you lean in, hold the book further away, or keep reading past them? Describe that moment.
- 2.This is a story about being alone in someone else's house. What is the sound or detail in an unfamiliar home that most unsettles you in real life, and did this book name it?
- 3.The book asks you to take an animal seriously as a presence rather than a prop. Has a pet in your life ever seemed to know something you did not? No judgment here, we are all believers tonight.
- 4.Where in the book did you actually feel comfortable, even briefly? A warm room, a kind gesture, a small routine. What did Rekulak give you to hold on to?
Going deep
- 1.Think about how it felt to keep turning pages when part of you wanted the main character to just leave. What kept you (and her) in that house, and what does that say about how you handle a bad feeling you cannot yet explain?
- 2.Without saying how things land, how did you feel in the last stretch: more tender toward the characters, more spooked, or oddly calm? Where did the book leave your heart rate versus your heart?
On the table & to sip
To eat
Cream of tomato soup with buttered toast soldiers for dipping
The exact meal you make in a strange kitchen at 9pm when you are pet-sitting and do not want to be clever. Warm, cheap, and it frees one hand for flipping pages.
Tuna melts cut into quarters
A nod to the cat at the center of it all, and the most forgiving finger food there is. Griddle them ahead and keep them in a low oven.
Milk-and-cookies platter (shortbread, oatmeal, something chocolate) with a jug of cold milk
A little saucer-of-milk joke, a lot of comfort. Lets people sit with something sweet while the conversation turns shivery.
To sip
Spiced hot cider with cinnamon and a slice of orange (no alcohol)
A slow-sipping, porch-light sort of drink for an October read about a house that is not yours.
Hot buttered rum
Warm, indulgent, and a touch old-house-and-heavy-drapes. Pour it for anyone who claims they were not scared.
Irish coffee with real whipped cream
For the people who stayed up too late finishing it. Keeps everyone awake through the deep questions.
Run of show
7:00
Soup on, lamps low
Have the pot warm and the cookies out before anyone sits down. Overhead lights off, two or three lamps on, so people relax instead of performing.
7:20
Pet-sitting horror stories
Run the two warm-ups as a loose go-around while people eat. This is the easiest laugh of the night and it gets quiet people talking first.
7:40
Pass the illustrations
Ask everyone to find the page that got them worst and hold the book up. Let the room react. This is the heart of a cozy night with this particular book.
8:00
Theme questions over refills
Work through the four theme questions. Top up cider and coffee as you go so nobody has to get up and break the mood.
8:35
The deep two, blankets encouraged
Hand out the deep questions on cards and let people answer in any order. Remind the group to speak about feelings, not plot mechanics, so late finishers stay safe.
9:00
Scorecards and next pick
Fill in scorecards, read a few out loud, then let people linger. Send leftovers home in jars.
Host tips
- Set one clear spoiler rule at the top: we can say how the ending made us feel, not what happens in it. With an illustrated thriller someone always reads ahead and someone always has 40 pages left.
- Keep the food one-handed and reheatable. People will be holding the book open on their knees all night.
- If the group goes quiet after a creepy stretch, that is a good silence. Let it sit for a beat, then pour something warm rather than filling it with a new question.
Playlist
Low lamplight: hushed folk, soft piano, and a few unsettling-but-pretty tracks that let dread drift in without breaking the warmth.
- 01 Black Cat - Broadcast
- 02 Pink Rabbits - The National
- 03 The Cat's Song - Vashti Bunyan
- 04 Twin Size Mattress (acoustic feel) - The Front Bottoms
- 05 Hiding Tonight - Alex Turner
- 06 Gymnopedie No. 1 - Erik Satie
- 07 Don't Fear the Reaper (acoustic cover) - Denny Laine
- 08 Nine Lives - Hiss Golden Messenger
Trivia
- 1.Which earlier bestseller by Jason Rekulak also blended a thriller plot with illustrations? (Hidden Pictures.)
- 2.Roughly how many pages of illustrations does Look What the Cat Dragged In contain? (More than 80.)
- 3.What year was the book published? (2026.)
- 4.What job does the young woman at the center of the story take on? (A pet-sitting job, looking after a cat.)
- 5.What genre label does the publisher give the book? (Supernatural thriller.)
- 6.Before writing fiction, Rekulak spent his career in what part of the book world? (Publishing, as an editor and publisher at Quirk Books.)
- 7.Rekulak's debut novel, published in 2017, was a coming-of-age story set in which decade? (The 1980s (The Impossible Fortress).)
- 8.The title plays on a familiar English idiom. What does 'look what the cat dragged in' usually mean when said to a person? (A teasing greeting for someone who turns up unexpectedly or looking rough.)
Bookmarks
Print, cut, and tuck one at every seat, a small keepsake from the night.
Rate the book
Coziness (did it let you relax between scares?)☆☆☆☆☆
Creep factor☆☆☆☆☆
The illustrations☆☆☆☆☆
How hard it was to put down☆☆☆☆☆
Would I pet-sit this cat☆☆☆☆☆
One word for how this book left you: ______________________
The page I had to look away from: ______________________
Who I would hand this book to next: ______________________
That's a wrap
Thank you for coming
We hope the company was good and the conversation even better. Until the next chapter.