1. "My name is Boris Balkan, and I once translated The Charterhouse of Parma. Apart from that, I've edited a few books on the nineteenth century popular novel, my reviews and articles appear in supplements and journals throughout Europe, and I organize summer school courses on contemporary writers" [p. 5]. What is unusual about the way Balkan introduces himself? Does his description of himself reflect his actions in the novel?

2. Corso is frequently described as resembling a wolf or a rabbit. Is either description an accurate depiction of his personality? Does Corso's character undergo a transformation by the end of the novel? And if so, what causes it?

3. Is Balkan a reliable narrator? How do you account for his detailed knowledge of Corso's activities? Why did Arturo Pérez-Reverte choose to use Balkan as a narrator? Is Corso also a narrator of the story? Who is in control of the narrative?

4. When Corso visits Varo Borja at the beginning of the novel he hears a "jarring sound, warning him. . . . He was no longer sure he wanted the job" [p. 51]. Why does Corso take the job despite his reservations? How do his feelings about books differ from Varo Borja's or Boris Balkan's?

5. Corso immediately notices Liana Taillefer's resemblance to Kim Novak, the actress who portrayed a beautiful witch in the 1958 film Bell, Book, and Candle. Does Corso use a literary and cinematic lens to view the other women he encounters in the book? How does he see Irene Adler?

6. What do the rooms in which Liana Taillefer, Boris Balkan, Corso, Varo Borja, and Victor Fargas live say about each of them? Are the rooms in any way deceptive? With what settings do you associate Irene Adler? What does the home address she gives say about her?

7. Balkan is very opinionated when it comes to the kind of writing he deems worthwhile [see pages 5, 98, 313, and 322]. Do you think Balkan would consider The Club Dumas a worthwhile piece of literature? Why?

8. The Club Dumas does not establish a precise time period. What era do you imagine The Club Dumas to take place? Do certain characters seem to exist in their own historical periods? If so, how does this effect the way characters construct their identities and how they perceive one another?

9. What are the sources of evil in the novel? Is Pérez-Reverte's interest in the presence of evil in modern history conveyed in his depiction of Varo Borja's desire to raise the devil through magic? Is Borja naive in believing that summoning the devil requires secret knowledge?

10. To what extent do the engravings in The Book of the Nine Doors to the Kingdom of Darkness illustrate Corso's quest for the truth about the two books he is trying to authenticate? What do you think engraving number VII, of a king and a servant playing chess, might represent in terms of Corso's adventure? And how does engraving number IX, of a woman riding a seven-headed dragon, illuminate Corso's discoveries?

11. Who is Irene Adler? Do you accept her explanation of her identity? How does the identity she constructs affect your understanding of the opposition of God and the devil in the novel?

12. Balkan tells Corso that "games are the only universally serious activity" [p.314]. How does Balkan's attitude to "the game" compare with that of Corso, Liana Taillefer, and Irene Adler? Does anyone win the game? Has Corso's attitude to the game changed by the end of the book?

13. Boris Balkan argues that he never led Corso to believe that there was a connection between "The Anjou Wine" and The Nine Doors: "It was you who filled in the blanks on your own, as if what happened were a novel based on trickery, with Lucas Corso the reader too clever for his own good. Nobody ever told you that things were actually as you thought. No, the responsibility is entirely yours, my friend. The real villain of the piece is your excessive intertextual reading and linking of literary references" [p. 334]. Is Balkan right? To what extent are Balkan and Corso responsible for the violence that occurs in the story?

14. Is the Club Dumas justified in its mission to protect the reputation of Alexandre Dumas by withholding evidence about his collaboration with his assistant Auguste Moquet? Why does Balkan care so much about Dumas's reputation? Does Balkan's attitude toward Dumas influence your opinion of Balkan?

15. Corso and Balkan argue about whether children and young people raised watching television have the "spiritual heritage" they themselves received from books and old movies [p. 325]. Could The Club Dumas have been written about television devotees? How would the characters and plot differ?

16. Corso recalls Nikon telling him, "Films are for everyone, collective, generous. . . . They're even better on TV: two can watch and comment. But your books are selfish. Solitary. . . . A person who is interested in books doesn't need other people and that frightens me" [p. 210]. Is Corso a frightening person because of his obsession with books? What about the other characters who share a passion for books? Is it significant that Irene Adler reads cheap paperbacks [p. 138]? Why doesn't Corso want to join the Club Dumas party?

1. Pearl’s narration is unique because of its level, calm tone throughout --- even when the events she describes are horrific. One is reminded of Wordsworth’s reference to “emotion recollected in tranquility.” It is almost as if Pearl is writing in a diary. What was Lisa See trying to accomplish in setting up this counterpoint between her tone and her narrative?

2. Pearl is a Dragon and May is a Sheep. Do you think the two sisters, in their actions in the novel, are true to their birth signs?

3. Which sister is smarter? Which is more beautiful?

4. Each sister believes that her parents loved the other sister more. Who is right about this? Why?

5. Pearl says that parents die, husbands and children can leave, but sisters are for life. Does that end up being true for Pearl? If you have a sister, to what extent does the relationship between Pearl and May speak to your own experience? What’s the difference between a relationship that’s “just like sisters” and a relationship between real sisters? Is there anything your sister could do that would cause an irreparable breach?

6. Z.G. talks about ai kuo, the love for your country, and ai jen, the emotion you feel for the person you love. How do these ideas play out in the novel?

7.Shanghai Girls makes a powerful statement about the mistreatment of Chinese immigrants in the United States. Were you surprised about any of the details in the novel related to this theme?

8. How would you describe the relationship between Pearl and May? How does the fact that both are, in a sense, Joy’s mother affect their relationship? Who loves Joy more and how does she show it?

9. Pearl doesn’t come to mother-love easily or naturally. At what point does she begin to claim Joy as her own? How, where, and why does she continue to struggle with the challenges of being a mother? Do you think this is an accurate portrayal of motherhood?

10. There are times when it seems like outside forces conspire against Pearl --- leaving China, working in the restaurant, not finding a job after the war, and taking care of Vern. How much of what happens to Pearl is a product of her own choices?

11. Pearl’s attitude toward men and the world in general is influenced by what happened to her in the shack outside Shanghai. To what extent does she find her way to healing by the end of the novel? Did your attitude toward Old Man Louie change? How do you feel about Sam and his relationship with Pearl and Joy? Did your impression of him change as the novel progressed?

12. The novel begins with Pearl saying, “I am not a person of importance” (p. 3). After Yen-yen dies, Pearl comments: “Her funeral is small. After all, she was not a person of importance, rather just a wife and mother” (p. 246). How do you react to comments like these?

13. Speaking of Yen-yen, Pearl notes: “When we’re packing, Yen-yen says she’s tired. She sits down on the couch in the main room and dies” (p. 246). Why does Pearl describe Yen-yen’s death in such an abrupt way?

14. After Joy points out the differences in the way Z.G. painted her mother and aunt in the Communist propaganda posters, May says, “Everything always returns to the beginning” (p. 267). Pearl has her idea of what May meant, but what do you think May really meant? And what is Pearl’s understanding of this saying at the end of the novel?

15. Near the end of Shanghai Girls, May argues that Pearl and Sam have withdrawn into a world of fear and isolation, not taking advantage of the opportunities open to them. Do you agree with May that much of Pearl’s sadness and isolation is self-imposed? Why or why not?

16. How do clothes define Pearl and May in different parts of the story? How do the sisters use clothes to manipulate others?

17. How does food serve as a gateway to memory in the novel? How does it illustrate culture and tradition both in the novel and in your own family?

18. What influence --- if any --- do Mama’s beliefs have on Pearl? How do they evolve over time?

19. Pearl encounters a lot of racism, but she also holds many racist views herself. Is she a product of her time? Do her attitudes change during the course of the story?

20. What role does place --- Shanghai, Angel Island, China City, and Chinatown --- serve in the novel? What do you think Lisa See was trying to say about “home”?

1. Annie Freeman's Fabulous Traveling Funeral opens with the dilemma of Katherine's disintegrating Bali bra. What does this situation tell us about her personality? In what way does it set the perfect tone? What enables the UPS driver to be so empathetic?

2. What were your first impressions of Annie G. Freeman after reading her obituary? How did you envision her by the end of the novel? What made her such a tireless champion for so many overlooked realms of humanity?

3. What did Annie mean in her instructions when she wrote, "Honor me now and you will honor yourselves"?

4. Did Annie's friendship with Katherine change very much from the time they were teenagers? How did "Katie" respond to Annie's suicide attempt? What were the greatest comforts they gave to each other over the years?

5. When Annie becomes Jill's protégé in Chapter Five, she says that she does not want to be challenged irresponsibly or tricked, and "I don't want to have to stand on my head to get a promotion." She also asks to be mentored and trained. What would it take to make such on-the-job negotiations the norm, full of candor and benevolence?

6. What transformations does Laura make during the traveling funeral? What is the significance of her prophetic feelings? Why was she the ideal lifeline for Annie on the night she was attacked?

7. What do Annie and Rebecca teach each other about control? What was at the heart of their initial struggle to get along as neighbors?

8. In what way is Marie distinct from the other women? What is the source of the special traits that make her a gifted hospice worker? What was the effect of her intangible presence on the trip, by cell phone and memory?

9. What do all of Annie's friends have in common? How does the theme of rescue and healing play out in their traveling funeral? What variations did you notice in the thoughts and responses recorded in the journal?

10. Discuss the men in Annie's life, ranging from John and their sons to the mysterious ex-husband who observes them in Manhattan. How was she able to balance love and independence? How would you characterize her life: bittersweet? Exhilarating?

11. Compare each of the destinations on Annie's itinerary. How do the landscapes form a complete portrait of her? What aspects of her life are captured by the various "guides" encountered on the trip?

12. Do you agree with the airport anthropologist's theory that the death of a loved one can restore other relationships in our lives? How have your friends, family, and community traditionally responded to grief? Why does the traveling funeral resonate with so many strangers near the end of their journey?

13. Discuss Balinda's presence. What is the role of spontaneity and improvisation in the traveling funeral? How do Balinda's plans for her mother convey the new perspective rippling throughout the travelers?

14. In Chapter Twenty-eight, Annie's friends express their anger--toward her, toward her death, and over the end of their beautiful time together. What healing comes from this anger?

15. If you were to plan your own traveling funeral, who would your "pallbearers" be? What places would you want them to visit together? What untold chapters of your life would you like them to discover along the way?

16. What common threads does Annie Freeman's Fabulous Traveling Funeral share with Kris Radish's previous novels? What makes each book's circle of friends unique?

1. On paper, Frede and Nikki are complete opposites. But beneath the surface, each has a bone-deep self-confidence. Give examples of this.
 

2. Why, in a day and age when women have made such progress, are there still so many women who lack self-confidence?
 

3. Is it possible to want to be accepted into a group or clique and not seem needy?
 

4. Can you ever really fit into a group that you weren’t born into?
 

5. What are some of the ways women shoot themselves in the foot with their friendships? With their careers?
 

6. How would Frede advise someone dating an “inappropriate” man? Conversely, what would Nikki say? What would you say?
 

7. Why does Nikki think it’s so important to join the Junior League? Why does her husband Howard think it’s important?
 

8. No matter where you are from, we all have learned “the rules” of our worlds, the secret handshakes of life that prove we belong to our world. What are some of “the rules” from the world you are from?
 

9. Why does Sawyer hide the fact that he has money? Does that make him more or less admirable?
 

10. Who, really, is the “devil” in the Junior League?
 

11. How would Frede and Nikki answer these questions?

a. What is your favorite perfume?

b. What is your favorite designer?

c. What is the best car to be seen in?

d. What is your favorite book?

e. What is your favorite piece of jewelry?

f. What is your dream vacation?
 

1. Consider Amy and Nick Dunne as characters. Do you find them sympathetic...at first? Talk about the ways each reveals him/herself over the course of the novel. At what point do your sympathies begin to change (if they do)?
 

2. Nick insists from the beginning he had nothing to do with Amy's disappearance. Did you believe him, initially? When did you begin to suspect that he might have something to do with it? At what point did you begin to think he might not?
 

3. How would you describe the couple's marriage? What does it look like from the outside...and what does it look like from the inside? Where do the stress lines fall in their relationship?
 

4. On their fifth anniversary, Nick wonders, "What have we done to each other? What will we do?" Is that the kind of question that might present itself in any marriage? Yours? In other words, does this novel make you wonder about your own relationship? And can you ever truly know the other person?
 

5. Amy and Nick lie. When did you begin to suspect that the two were lying to one another...and to you, the reader? Why do they lie...what do they gain by it?
 

6. Do you find the Gillian Flynn's technique of alternating first-person narrations compelling...or irritating. Would you have preferred a single, straightforward narrator? What does the author gain by using two different voices?
 

7. A skillful mystery writer knows which details to reveal and when to reveal them. How much do you know...and when do you know it? In other words, how good is Flynn at burying her clues in plain sight? Now that you know how the story plays out, go back and pick out the clues she left behind for you.
 

8. Flynn divides her narrative into two parts. Why? What are the difference between the two sections?
 

9. In what way does Amy's background—her parents' books about her perfection—affect her as an adult?
 

10. The Dunnes move to North Carthage, near Hannibal, the home of Mark Twain. How has Tom Sawyer  been worked into Gone Girl...and why? What does that extra-textual detail add to the story?
 

11. Did you suspect Nick's big secret? Were you surprised—shocked—by it? Or did you have an inkling?
 

12. Does Amy try hard enough to like North Carthage? Or is she truly a duck out of water, too urbane to ever fit into a small, Midwestern town?
 

13. What are Amy's treasure hunts all about? Why does she initiate them for Nick?
 

14. Critics, to a one, talk about the book's dark humor and author's wit. What passages of the book do you find particularly funny?
 

15. Movie time: who would you like to see play what part?

3.  Was there any particular person or family whose circumstances or letter touched you?  If so, who, and more importantly, why?

 
4.  Why were some people able to transcend their circumstances while others did not? Was it Luck? Timing? Skill? Connections?


5.  How did our society move from not talking about our personal hardships to airing every detail of our hardships on national television?  What encouraged society to change?   Will there be a resurgence in modesty?

 
6.  Do you view yourself as someone who would have reached out to B. Virdot?  Why or why not?

3. When Thomas is killed, Frankie imagines his parents sitting miles away, not knowing what has happened to their son and realizes there is no way for her to tell them. Today it is rare that news can’t be delivered. In this age of news 24/7, are we better off?


4. Seek Truth. Report it. Minimize Harm. That is the journalist’s code. And it haunts Frankie during the book. Why wasn’t Frankie able to deliver the letter or tell Emma about meeting Will? For someone whose job was to deliver the news, did she fail?


5. If you were Iris, would you have delivered the letter? Why or why not? Was she wrong not to deliver it? What good, if any, grew up in the gap of time Emma didn’t know the news? What was taken from Emma in not knowing immediately what happened?
 

6. In the funk hole, Will says that “everything adds up”, but Frankie disagrees, saying that life is a series of “random, incomprehensible accidents”. Which philosophy do you believe? Which theory does The Postmistress make a better case for?
 

7. After Thomas tells his story of escape, the old woman in the train compartment says “There was God looking out for you at every turn.” Thomas disagrees. “People looked out. Not God.” He adds, “There is no God. Only us.” How does THE POSTMISTRESS raise the questions of faith in wartime? How does this connect to the decisions Iris and Frankie make with regard to Emma?
 

8. Why do you think Maggie’s death compels Will to leave for England?
 

9. The novel deals with the last summer of innocence for the United States before it was drawn into WWII and before the United States was attacked. Do you see any modern-day parallels? And if so, what?
10. What are the pleasures and drawbacks of historical novels? Is there a case to be made the The Postmistress is not about the 1940’s so much as it uses the comfortable distance of that time and place in order to ask questions about war? About accident? Aren’t all novels historical? Why or why not?
 

11. We know that Emma was orphaned, that Will’s father had drinking problems, that Iris’s brother was killed in the First War, and that Frankie grew up in a brownstone in Washington Square. How do these characters’ backgrounds shape the decisions that they make? And if we didn’t have this information, would our opinion of the characters and their actions change? 12. Early in the novel, Frankie reflects on the fact that most people believed that “women shouldn’t be reporting the war.” Do you think that Frankie’s gender influences her reporting? How does Frankie deal with being a female in a male-dominated field? And do you think female reporters today are under closer scrutiny because of their gender?
 

12. Why does Otto refuse to tell the townspeople that he’s Jewish? Do you think he’s right not to do so?


13. Why is the certificate of virginity so important to Iris? What does it tell us about her character?


14. When Frankie returns to America, she doesn’t understand finds it impossible to grasp that people are calmly going about their lives while war rages in Europe. What part does complacency play in The Postmistress?


15. Discuss the significance of the Martha Gellhorn quote at the beginning of the book, “War happens to people, one by one. That is really all I have to say, and it seems to me I have been saying it forever.” What stance towards war, and of telling a war story does this reveal? How does it inform your reading of The Postmistress?

1. According to one theory, our identity is shaped by our genes, immutable and unchanging. Others argue that our character is informed by our experiences, upbringing, and surroundings. Discuss the idea of "nature versus nurture" as it applies to Nonny and her two families in Between, Georgia. Which do you think played a bigger role in the formation of your own character and identity?

2. How is the setting of Jackson's book critical to the story? Could these characters exist in any small town, or are they necessarily products of Between, Georgia?

3. In the book the Fretts are portrayed as upstanding churchgoing citizens and the Crabtrees as a rulebreaking bunch of scofflaws. Upon close inspection, how do their actions in these pages support or refute their reputations? What is your true definition of abusing authority and how does it compare to that of each family?

4. Nonny is drawn to Henry and Jonno for different reasons. What does each man seem to represent to her?

5. Stacia, as a deaf blind character, calls into question the process of "knowing" others. How does Stacia replace seeing and hearing as avenues to "knowing" the people she loves and detests?

6. What does Jackson mean when she says on p. 181 that Mama had "quietly found her own way to make the world tell lies, and SAY that it was safe"? Do you believe she was justified in her surreptitious actions here? Which other characters engage in deception in the pages you have read? Do their ends justify their means?

7. The idea of ownership is a central theme in the book. How do each of the main characters go about staking claims on other people, things, and even Between itself? To what extent can one "own" another person? Why is it so important for the people of Between to feel they own something? How can the feeling of ownership toward another person be detrimental? How can it be positive?

8. Nonny engages in relations with Henry while technically still married to Jonno, and Bernese, while critical of these acts, is shown to have engaged in extracurricular activities as well. What is each character's view towards marriage? Were you sympathetic to their perspectives throughout the book? Did you change your opinion by the end?

9. Motherhood is a key theme in Between, Georgia. What role do non-traditional mothers play in the story? How do the non-traditional mother-daughter relationships in the book compare to the traditional ones?

10. Years of feuding between the Frett and Crabtree families is brought to fruition through a series of violent events starting with the dog attack. Why do you think the author chooses violence to initiate healing?

11. The characters in Between, Georgia seem to express care and concern for each other by administering tough love. What are some examples of tough love in the book? Is this approach an effective one?

12. Discuss the ways in which Nonny and the residents of Between, Georgia are stuck in certain patterns of behavior. Why do they seem unable to make progress in some aspects of their lives? Is this inertia a function of who they are, or of their surroundings and circumstances?

13. In the future, what would you expect to happen to the families? Would they still be in Between? What would be the status of Henry and Nonny's relationship? Is the feud truly over?

1. What effect did the photographs have on how you experienced this novel? In fact, what was your reading experience of Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children? How did it make you feel? Were you disturbed...or fascinated...or something else?  Did the book hold your interest?

2. What's wrong with Jacob Portman? What's his problem?

3. What about Abe Portman, what kind of character is he? What kind of a world does he create in his stories for young Jacob? Why do the stories intrigue Jacob so much?

4. As he moves into adolescence, why does Jacob begin to doubt the veracity of his grandfather's stories? In what way does he think they may be connected to Abe's struggle under the Nazis?

5. What makes Jacob think his grandfather's death is more sinister than what the official version claims.

6. Talk about the house in Wales. When Jacob first lays eyes on it, he observes that it "was no refuge from monsters, but a monster itself." Would you say the house serves as a setting to the story...or is its role something else—a character, perhaps?

7. What are the atmospherics used to build suspense in the novel. Find some examples of how the author uses language to instill unease, fear, and tension.

8. Are you able to make sense of the "after," the time loop? Can you explain it? Do you enjoy the way Riggs plays with time in his novel?

9. Were you surprised by the direction that the story took? Were you expecting it to go elsewhere? Were you able to suspend disbelief enough to enjoy the story's turn of events?

10. Talk, of course, about the peculiar children. Which of their oddities and personalities do you find most intriguing?

11. Some readers have complained about the inconsistency of the narrative voice, that it was perhaps too sophisticated for a young boy, even an adolescent? Do you agree, or disagree? Does the narrative voice change during the course of the novel?

12. In what way can this book be seen as a classic quest story—a young hero who undertakes a difficult journey and is transformed in the process? Do you see parallels with other fantasy works involving young people?

13. Does the end satisfy? Are loose ends tied up....or left hanging? This is the first book of a planned series. Will you read future installments? Where do you think Riggs will take his readers next?

1. William Dodd went to Germany believing that Hitler would have a positive influence on Germany. Why were so many at first enamored of Nazism and willing "to give Hitler everything he wants"?

2. How would you describe German society at the time of the Dodd Family's arrival in Berlin? Talk about the ways in which Germany appeared to be a modern, civilized society...and, of course, the way in which that appearance was at odds with reality.

3. What was it that made Dodd begin to suspect the rumors he had been hearing about Nazi brutality were true?

4. Why did Dodd's—and numerous others'—warnings about Hitler fall on indifferent ears in the US? What was the primary concern of the US in its relationship with Germany? Was the US stance one of purposeful ignorance...or of sheer disbelief?

5. Did America's own anti-semitism play any role in dismissing the growing chorus of concern ?

6. What do you think of William Dodd? What about him do you find admirable? Were you mildly amused or impressed by his sense of frugality?

7. What was Dodd's reputation among the "old hands" at the State Department? What role does class play in how he was viewed by his diplomatic peers?

8. What about Martha? What do you find in her character to admire...or not? Did she purposely allow herself to be blinded by Udet and Rudolf Diels...or was she truly dazzled by their charms? Her promiscuity could have made her a serious liability. Were you surprised that her parents seemed untroubled by her multiple love affairs, or that they didn't try to reign in her behavior?

9. How does Erik Larson portray Hitler in his book? Does he humanize him...or present him as a monster? How does he depict Goebbels and Goering...and other higher-ups in the Nazi party?

10. How does the fact that you know the eventual outcome of Nazi Germany affect the way you experience the book? Does foreknowledge heighten...or lessen the story's suspense. Either way...why?

11. What were events/episodes you find most chilling in Larson's account of the rise of Nazism?

12. What have learned about the period leading up the World War II that you hadn't known? What surprised you? What confirmed things you already knew?

13. Is this a good read? If you've read other books by Larson, how does this compare?

1. Rose goes through life feeling people’s emotions through their food. Many eat to feel happy and comforted. Does this extreme sensory experience bring any happiness to Rose or only sadness?

2. What does Rose mean when she says her dad always seemed like a guest to her? How does this play out in the rest of the novel?

3. “Mom's smiles were so full of feeling that people leaned back a little when she greeted them. It was hard to know just how much was being offered.” What does Rose mean and how does this trait affect the mother’s relationships?

4. Why do you think the dad like medical dramas but hate hospitals?

5. Rose says, “Mom loved my brother more. Not that she didn’t love me --- - I felt the wash of her love everyday, pouring over me, but it was a different kind, siphoned from a different, and tamer, body of water. I was her darling daughter; Joseph was her it.” Do you think Rose is right in her estimation and why do you think the mother might feel this way?

6. What does the grandmother suggest when she tells Rose “you don’t even know me, How can you love me?” How has the grandmother’s relationship with Rose’s own mother affected the family dynamic?

7. What is Joseph trying to accomplish by drawing a ‘perfect’ circle when it, by very definition, is impossible? How does George’s idea to create wallpaper out of the imperfections affect him? How does validation and affection through art recur in the novel and what does it signify?

8. Why does George suddenly conclude Rose’s gift isn’t really a problem and stops investigating it?

9. What is the significance of the mother’s commitment to carpentry (compared to other, short-lived hobbies)? How does this play out in the rest of the novel?

10. What is the impact of Rose's discovery about her father's skills? Did this change the way you see the father?

11. Joseph is described as a desert and geode while Rose is a rainforest and sea glass. Discuss the implications.

12. Why does Rose want to keep the thread-bare footstool of her parents’ courtship instead of having her mother make her a new one?

13. Are the family dinners --- - with Joseph reading, the dad eating, Rose silently trying to survive the meal and the mom talking non-stop --- - emblematic of the family dynamic? How has it evolved over the years?

14. How did you experience the scene in Joseph's room, when Rose goes to see him? What did that experience mean to Rose? Is there any significance to Joseph choosing a card table chair?

15. What does the last image about the trees have to do with this family? How do you interpret the last line of the novel?

1. Discuss the relationship between Bruno and Gretel. Why does Bruno seem younger than nine? In a traditional fable, characters are usually one-sided. How might Bruno and Gretel be considered one-dimensional?

2. At age 12, Gretel is the proper age for membership in the League of Young Girls, a branch of Hitler’s Youth Organization. Why do you think she is not a member, especially since her father is a high-ranking officer in Hitler's army?

3. What is it about the house at Out-With that makes Bruno feel “cold and unsafe”? How is this feeling perpetuated as he encounters people like Pavel, Maria, Lt. Kotler, and Shmuel?

4. Describe his reaction when he first sees the people in the striped pajamas. What does Gretel mean when she says, “Something about the way [Bruno] was watching made her feel suddenly nervous”? (p. 28) How does this statement foreshadow Bruno’s ultimate demise?

5. Bruno asks his father about the people outside their house at Auschwitz. His father answers, “They’re not people at all Bruno.” (p. 53) Discuss the horror of this attitude. How does his father’s statement make Bruno more curious about Out-With?

6. Explain what Bruno’s mother means when she says, “We don’t have the luxury of thinking.” (p. 13) Identify scenes from the novel that Bruno’s mother isn’t happy about their life at Out-With. Debate whether she is unhappy being away from Berlin, or whether she is angry about her husband’s position. How does Bruno’s grandmother react to her son’s military role?

7. When Bruno and his family board the train for Auschwitz, he notices an over-crowded train headed in the same direction. How does he later make the connection between Shmuel and that train? How are both trains symbolic of each boy’s final journey?

8. Bruno issues a protest about leaving Berlin. His father responds, “Do you think that I would have made such a success of my life if I hadn’t learned when to argue and when to keep my mouth shut and follow orders?” (p. 49) What question might Bruno’s father ask at the end of the novel?

9. A pun is most often seen as humorous. But, in this novel the narrator uses dark or solemn puns like Out-With and Fury to convey certain meanings. Bruno is simply mispronouncing the real words, but the author is clearly asking the reader to consider a double meaning to these words. Discuss the use of this wordplay as a literary device. What is the narrator trying to convey to the reader? How do these words further communicate the horror of the situation?

10. When Bruno dresses in the filthy striped pajamas, he remembers something his grandmother once said. “You wear the right outfit and you feel like the person you’re pretending to be.” (p, 205) How is this true for Bruno? What about his father? What does this statement contribute to the overall meaning of the story?

11. Discuss the moral or message of the novel. What new insights and understandings does John Boyne want the reader to gain from reading this story?

1. What do you think the title The Peach Keeper means? Who is the peach keeper in the story?

2. Superstitions played a big part in Willa's grandmother's life, and in Willa's life, by extension. What superstitions did you grow up with? Why do you think superstitions exist?

3. Several of the characters in The Peach Keeper struggle with how people used to see them as opposed to who they are now. Who were you in high school? Do you miss that person? Or are you glad to leave that time in your life behind?

4. The characters in The Peach Keeper live in an extraordinarily beautiful area, one surrounded by waterfalls. Yet Willa once remarks, "When you see it every day, sometimes you wonder what the big deal is." Do you think you get so used to beauty that you stop seeing it? What are some natural wonders in your area? Does Willa's comment also refer to people?

5. There's a wisp of something supernatural following the characters in the story, seemingly brought into their lives by the discovery of buried bones under a peach tree. What are your thoughts on the supernatural? Do you think disturbing a grave upsets the spiritual side of things? Have you ever had a paranormal experience?

6. One of the prevailing themes in The Peach Keeper is friendship. Agatha and Georgie are elderly, and have been friends all their lives. Paxton and Willa have a newly formed friendship. The book posits that friendship is "a living breathing thing, something that comes to life the moment it happens and doesn't just go away when it's no longer acknowledged." If there is no big break-up, just a gradual separation, do you think the friendship still exists? Do you think once you are a friend, are you always a friend? Have you ever reconnected with an old friend and found that you still share a bond with them?

7. Sarah Addison Allen's books usually have themes of forgiveness and food. Have you read Sarah's other books? How is The Peach Keeper similar? How is it a departure? Did you recognize the reference to the main characters in her debut novel, Garden Spells?

8. Paxton, Willa, and even Willa's father, deal with parental expectation. Do you think that who we become in life is due in part to what our parents wanted us to be, or who are parents were? If you have children, how do they fit the pattern?

9. How do you take your coffee? Do you think that says something about you? Do you believe, like Rachel, that how someone takes their coffee says something about their personality?

10. In the end, Agatha keeps a secret she promised to keep seventy-five years ago. In this information age, we are not a private society. How hard is it to keep secrets? Would you be capable of keeping a secret that long?

11. The theme of roots runs through the novel --- from the peach tree, to Colin's work, to the characters struggling with their place in Walls of Water. What about the town and its history draws people to it and entices them to put down roots? On the flip side, what about it causes others to deny their roots and move away? Have you had a similar experience with your home town?

1. There has been a recent --- and growing --- resurgence of interest in knitting. Why do you think that is? What draws each of these characters --- Lydia, Bethanne, Elise and Courtney --- to the activity of knitting? Do you think there are reasons beyond the obvious ones they themselves give?

2. The shop, A Good Yarn, symbolizes Lydia's hope for --- and belief in --- the future after her triumph over cancer in The Shop on Blossom Street. It's now a successful business. Do you think the shop's meaning has changed?

3. All the characters in this book are coping with or recovering from some form of loss --- financial loss in Elise's case, the loss of a marriage in Bethanne's, the loss of her mother and absence of family in Courtney's. Even Lydia undergoes the loss (temporary though it turns out to be) of the man she loves --- and the beginning stages of losing her mother. What does each woman learn from these experiences? Does loss diminish them or make them stronger? Do their growing friendships --- and their knitting --- contribute to their ability to absorb and transcend their losses?

4. In your view, is there a particular significance to the fact that the women are knitting socks? Debbie Macomber has said that the socks are, in part, a reference to the old saying, "Walk a mile in my shoes," which suggests the importance of both compassion and tolerance. How is this relevant to the story? Are the socks themselves integral to A Good Yarn --- or could Lydia's class have been knitting anything?

5. Friendship, especially friendships among women, is an important theme in this author's stories. What role does knitting play in the forming of these friendships? Is there something special about knitting --- does it bring something unique to the relationships in the story that some other activity would not have? One of the quotes in the book, from Mary Colucci, suggests that "Knitters just naturally create communities of friends...." Do you agree?

6. According to another quote, this one from knitting designer Nancy Bush, "Making a sock by hand creates a connection to history...." In other words, knitting connects the knitter to the past. How? Is that a factor in this story? As Debbie Macomber has said, it's also about the importance of having faith in the future. Are these two beliefs mutually exclusive?

7. Another theme that plays a key role in Debbie Macomber's books is the concept of home and community. How important is that in this story --- and to the various characters? As well, it could be said that each of these characters becomes part of more than one new community. Do you agree that, for them, belonging to this small community of knitters is where it all starts?

8. Each character helps at least one of the others in some important way. For instance, Elise encourages and inspires Bethanne to start her own business, Courtney rescues Annie from a dangerous situation, Lydia gives Margaret money, and so on. The ultimate is Maverick's "Fairy Godfather." Do you think it's fair to say that the giver derives as much benefit and pleasure as the recipient? In what ways? Would you agree that these characters practice the "pay it forward" philosophy --- passing on whatever good has been done for them?

9. In Debbie Macomber's stories, there is often a balance between solving one's own problems and accepting the help and guidance of others. Do you find that to be true here? What is the relationship between the two?

10. The shop and the story are both called A Good Yarn. The knitting sessions are a chance for the women to tell their own stories and to listen to one another's --- to share their "yarns" in more ways than one. Do you feel knitting and storytelling share a natural connection?

1. What was the nature of Poppy's relationship with her mother? How does it affect her?

2. What is the basis of Poppy's ties to Lake Henry?

3. Why did Poppy feel guilty about the accident? Why didn't she think she deserved certain things? Did this affect the way some people viewed her or treated her?

4. Are the characteristics of a small town good or bad?

5. Was Griffin proactive or reactive?

6. What is the role of the past and guilt in our lives?

7. Why did Rose treat Poppy the way she did?

8. Was Heather right to keep silent around Missy and Star?

9. What was the nature of Heather's guilt?

10. What kind of relationship will Heather and Thea have in the future?

11. Why did Delinsky choose the title, “The Accidental Woman?”

1. During the sixties and seventies, the Angry Housewives smoked cigarettes and threw back highballs-even while pregnant-without knowledge of the harm it could do. If they could have glimpsed their futures then, what do you think would have surprised them most about their future selves? What is one thing you know now that you would have really appreciated being aware of ten years ago?

2. Why do you think groups like AHEB-women who live near each other, raise children together, and bond over books together-persist even in a climate of working moms and in a culture that is flooded with other types of media?

3. Discuss Faith's letters to her deceased mother. What kind of catharsis do they provide Faith, and how do the tone and nature of the letters change as the years go by?

4. Audrey gets a kick out of introducing Kari to strangers as a recently released convict. Discuss the women's jokes, nicknames, and embarrassing moments-how does humor work to solidify friendship?

5. Kari faces a critical decision when Mary Jo forbids her from telling Anders that the baby is his grandchild. Would you be able to keep such a secret? For which character is this secret most constructive; for which is it most destructive?

6. The women suggest that Slip thinks that by wearing revealing clothes Audrey perpetuates her role as a sex object and "subverts [her] real self." Audrey replies that she takes no one's opinion into account when she dresses-she simply likes it. How much does physical appearance burden or bless the women in AHEB? Do you think it is easy to make generalizations regarding persons who dress provocatively?

7. Faith becomes a guardian figure after staying up with the gun waiting for Eric Iverson's return, and keeping watch over Slip in the hospital bed, prepared to confront the Grim Reaper. What do you think are her conscious or subconscious motivations for being ever watchful?

8. Audrey has a talent for sensing upcoming events. In what ways do her capabilities influence how she deals with her family? Does it differ from how they affect her friendships? How much do you believe in psychic phenomena? Would being endowed with such a gift help or hinder one's decisions?

9. Merit is ashamed that a part of her believes her mother's statement that her brave Aunt Gaylene--happily unmarried, fulfilled with friends and books--was "living half a life." What sides of Merit's character produce these contradictory feelings? How do you think the other women of AHEB would respond to this opinion, and why?

10. At the AHEB meeting for The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, the women toast their favorite and most influential teachers. In what other ways does the act of teaching influence the relationships in this novel?

11. Slip and Audrey allow a conflict between their children to seriously harm their friendship for a short time. If you ever had the desire to openly criticize a friend because of the way he or she raised a child, would you do so? How does Landvik's portrayal of differing parenting techniques and the children they produce function as social commentary within the novel?

12. What do you think caused Faith to (almost absent-mindedly) bring Audrey to Trilby? How did confronting Beau's sexuality help her have the strength to confront the reality of her own past?

13. Merit attributes her quiet acts of rebellion--trash rolled up furtively in her hair, choosing only banned books for AHEB meetings--to her maintenance of sanity during her years of marriage. What do you make of these coping methods? How do they compare to the methods of the other women in AHEB? Discuss your own strategies for staying lucid and balanced when confronted with situations that can be unbearable.

14. Kari and Mary Jo both question the timing and content of their admission to Julia after it's too late. Do you think it would have been wiser to have Julia grow up knowing the truth, or perhaps never knowing at all? How do you feel about Kari's impromptu decision to come clean in front of Mary Jo and without her prior knowledge? Was Julia right to be so upset?

15. How do you feel about the later inclusion of Grant as a member of AHEB? Did you think the inclusion of a male affected their particular group dynamic? What is valuable about inviting men to participate in women's dialogue?

16. Merit eventually finds Paradise, literally and figuratively. Do you believe that good things come to people who wait?

17. At the peace march, Fred states that, "Only by trying to help someone else save their life could I save my own." What do you make of this statement considering the horrors he experienced during the war? Do other characters in the novel embody or contradict this notion? Are certain characters better described as saviors than saved?

18. How are midwestern values portrayed in this book? In what ways might the book have differed if it had been set in the northeast or the south?

19. Slip is described throughout the book as the strongest--physically--of the Angry Housewives, in addition to her dynamic will and stalwart convictions. What emotions are stirred when someone who is perceived as invincible suddenly becomes critically ill? How does she continue to display conviction and energy? Do you think she will prevail?

20. Audrey says she believes in luck and God acting in tandem. What events in her life do you think contributed to this belief? How much weight do you give this sentiment regarding your own life? Do you think people tend to attribute life's painful events more to luck or to God? What about the joyous events?

21. Did you like the format of the book? How did giving every character the opportunity to voice their thoughts support the all-for-one and one-for-all theme of the book and the club itself?

22. This book covers a lot of ground, both personal and political. What do you think the most important lesson these women learn over thirty years is? Which characters were most ripe for change with the political and cultural tide? Whose story did you think most embodied the emergence of women as a growing force outside the home?

23. In order to attain a greater understanding of herself, Faith utilizes therapy, learns from her friendships and culls inspiration from books. How do these three supplement each other as means of self discovery? Which books and authors have inspired you most through the years?

24. What did you think of Merit's idea to unite mothers around the world to stop war and halt violence? Were you surprised this notion came from her?

25. Slip tells Merit that re-dubbing their book club Angry Housewives Eating Bon Bons would be taking their husbands' words and "giving them and their chauvinism the finger." What other subversive techniques do the women display for giving chauvinism the finger? Do you feel it's an apt name for the club and all it turns out to be?

26. Discuss Kari's notion that her heart was able to put itself back together after the loss of Bjorn much like a lizard that can regenerate a tail. Do you think this sort of regeneration would have ever been possible without the arrival of Julia?

27. Marjorie McMahon has a plethora of nicknames: Slip, Warrior Bear, the Big Kahuna; and she is called everything from a leprechaun to a member of a "bloodstained group of nuts." What in her character lends itself so well to these various labels? Which do you think is the most accurate?

28. What do you think about Merit's final interaction with Eric Iverson? Was the slap beneath her or just what he deserved?

29. How does AHEB compare to your book club? Are there any ideas in the novel, like themes for meetings, which you'd like to incorporate?

30. Which character was your favorite? Was she or he the one you identified most with?

31. A number of the characters in the book harbor secrets. What does secret-keeping do characters like Faith and Fred, who fear their actual secrets as opposed to Kari or Beau who fear the reactions of others?

1. Discuss the different narrative structures employed in A Secret Kept. What do you think the author intended to achieve with each? Do you prefer one over the others?

2. How does the author describe the classic, wealthy 16th arrondissement of Paris --- where Blanche Rey's apartment and the avenue Kleber one are located --- as opposed to where Antoine lives, on the Left bank? What does this tell you about the Rey family?

3. Part of the novel takes place on Noirmoutier Island which is connected to the west coast of France by the Gois Passage. Why is Antoine so attached to Gois Passage? Do you see any parallels between the author’s descriptions of this place and the story as a whole?

4. What was your impression of Antoine at the beginning of the book? What about at the end? Over the course of the novel, how does he change and what does he learn about himself?

5. Discuss the different themes and imagery of death that come up in the novel and that Antoine has to face. Did you find them morbid? Or realistic?

6. Did you like the character of the sexy, streewise mortician Angèle Rouvatier? What makes her different from other heroines and what do you think she represents? In what ways does she have a hand in the changes in Antoine’s character?

7. François and Antoine Rey are two opposite personalities, as fathers, husbands, brothers, and sons. Discuss specific differences you see. Do you believe Antoine will ever get through to his father? What exactly do you think François knows about Clarisse, her life, her death?

8. Clarisse Rey is the invisible woman of this book. Yet her letters, photos, and the film that Antoine watches at the end, as well as Gaspard's confession, gradually expose her. What kind of woman was she? What do we learn about her? Compare her to Angèle, Melanie, and Astrid.

9. How do Melanie and Antoine react differently when they discover the truth about their mother and her death? Why do you think that Melanie chooses not to remember? Do you think you would react more like Melanie or Antoine?

10. This novel explores taboo subjects and family secrets in a conservative French bourgeois society. Discuss those subjects and whether they would be taboo if the novel were set in the USA. What do you think really happened the day Clarisse went to confront Blanche?

11. Do you personally believe that family secrets should be revealed or hidden forever? In cases like the novel’s, do you think the truth is more painful than lying?

12. If you have read Sarah's Key --- also by de Rosnay --- can you point to any themes that are found in both books?

1. The first narrator in My Ántonia is an unnamed speaker who grew up with Jim Burden and meets him years later on a train. Jim tells his story in response to this mysterious figure, who disappears from the novel as soon as the Introduction is over. How does this first narrator's disappearance foreshadow other withdrawals within this novel, which at times resembles a series of departures? Why might Cather have chosen to frame her narrative in this fashion?

2. When Jim arrives in Nebraska, he sees "nothing but land: not a country at all, but the material out of which countries are made." [11-12] Yet at the novel's end that landscape is differentiated. It has direction and color--red grass, blue sky, dun-shaded bluffs. We are reminded of the beginning of the Book of Genesis, and of God's parting of the heavens from the earth. To what extent is My Ántonia an American Genesis? What are its agents of creation and differentiation?

3. Just as My Ántonia's setting is initially raw and featureless, its narrative at first seems haphazard: "'I didn't arrange or rearrange. I simply wrote down what of herself and myself and other people's Ántonia's name recalls to me. I suppose it hasn't any form.'" [6] Is Burden's description really accurate? Although the narrative proceeds chronologically, its structure is unconventional, as Ántonia is present in only three of the five sections and much of her story unfolds via exposition. What effect does Cather produce by telling her story in this fashion?

4. One of the greatest difficulties facing the Shimerdas and other immigrant families is that posed by their lack of English, which seals them off from all but the most forthcoming of their neighbors. Yet even American-born arrivals to Nebraska find themselves set apart. As the narrator notes in the Introduction, "no one who had not grown up in a little prairie town could know anything about it. It was a kind of freemasonry, we said." [3] What is the nature of this freemasonry? What experiences do the inhabitants of this world share that are alien--and perhaps incommunicable--to people raised elsewhere? Does the shared experience of the novel's pioneers end up counting for more than their linguistic and ethnic differences?

5. What is it that makes Mr. Shimerda unable to adapt to his new home and ultimately drives him to suicide? Is he simply too refined--too rooted in Europe--to endure the harshness and solitude of the prairie? Before we jump to too easy a conclusion, we might consider the fact that the novel's other suicide, Wick Cutter, is a crass, upwardly mobile small-town entrepreneur. What do these two deaths suggest about the prerequisites for surviving in Cather's world?

6. From their first meeting, when Jim begins to teach Ántonia English, he serves as her instructor and occasional guardian. Yet he also seems in awe of Ántonia. What is it that makes her superior to him? What does she possess that Jim doesn't? What makes her difference so desirable?

7. At times Jim's feelings towards Ántonia suggest romantic infatuation, yet their relationship remains chaste. Nor does Jim ever become sexually involved with the alluring--and more available--Lena Lingard. Curiously, Ántonia appears to disapprove of their flirtation. And, whether he is conscious of it or not, Jim seems wedded to the idea of Tony as a sexual innocent. Following the failed assault by Wick Cutter, "I hated her almost as much as I hated Cutter. She had let me in for all this disgustingness." [186] How do you account for these characters' ambivalent and at times squeamish attitude toward sexuality? In what ways do they change when they marry and--in Ántonia's case--bear children?

8. Just as it is possible to read Lena Lingard as Ántonia's sensual twin, one can see the entire novel as consisting of doubles and repetitions. Ántonia has two brothers, the industrious and amoral Ambrosch and the sweet-natured, mentally incompetent Marek. Wick Cutter's suicide echoes that of Mr. Shimerda. Even minor anecdotes have a way of mirroring each other. Just as the Russians Peter and Pavel are stigmatized because they threw a bride to a pursuing wolf pack, the hired hand Otto is burdened by an act of generosity on his voyage over to America, when the woman he is escorting ends up giving birth to triplets. Where else in the novel do events and characters mirror each other? What is the effect of this symmetry and its variations?

9. In one of her essays, Willa Cather observed, "I have not much faith in women in fiction." [cited in Hermione Lee, Willa Cather: Double Lives. New York, Vintage, 1991, p. 12] Yet in Ántonia Cather has created a genuinely heroic woman. What perceived defects in earlier fictional heroines might Cather be trying to redeem in this novel? Do her female characters seem nobler, better, or more deeply felt than their male counterparts? In spite of this, why might Cather have chosen to make My Ántonia' s narrator a man?

10. For her epigraph Cather uses a quote from Virgil: Optima dies...prima fugit: "The best days are the first to pass." How is this idea borne out within My Ántonia? In what ways can the novel's early days, with their scenes of poverty, hunger and loss, be described as the best? What does Jim, the novel's presiding consciousness, lose in the process of growing up? Does Ántonia lose it as well? How is this notion of lost happiness connected to Jim's observation: "That is happiness: to be dissolved into something complete and great"?

11. Although My Ántonia is elegiac in its tone--and has been used in high school curricula to convey a conservative view of the American past--it is also notable for its striking realism about gender and culture. Not only does the novel have a female protagonist who prevails in spite of male betrayal and abuse (and two secondary female characters who prosper without ever marrying), it also portrays the early frontier as a multicultural quilt in which Bohemians, Swedes, Austrians, and a blind African-American retain their ethnic identities without dissolving in the American melting pot. Significantly, at the novel's end Ántonia has reverted to speaking Bohemian with her husband and children. How important are these themes to the novel's overall vision? Do they accurately reflect the history of the western frontier?

1. In The Giver, each family has two parents, a son, and a daughter. The relationships are not biological but are developed through observation and a careful handling of personality. In our own society, the makeup of family is under discussion. How are families defined? Are families the foundations of a society, or are they continually open for new definitions?

2. In Jonas’s community, every person and his or her experience are precisely the same. The climate is controlled, and competition has been eliminated in favor of a community in which everyone works only for the common good. What advantages might “Sameness” yield for contemporary communities? Is the loss of diversity worthwhile?

3. Underneath the placid calm of Jonas’s society lies a very orderly system of euthanasia, practiced on the very young who do not conform, the elderly, and those whose errors threaten the stability of the community. What are the disadvantages and benefits of a community that accepts such a vision of euthanasia?

4. Why is the relationship between Jonas and The Giver dangerous, and what does this danger suggest about the nature of love?

5. The ending of The Giver may be interpreted in two very different ways. Perhaps Jonas is remembering his Christmas memory–one of the most beautiful that The Giver transmitted to him–as he and Gabriel are freezing to death, falling into a dreamlike coma in the snow. Or perhaps Jonas does hear music and, with his special vision, is able to perceive the warm house where people are waiting to greet him. In her acceptance speech for the Newbery Medal, Lois Lowry mentioned both possibilities but would not choose one as correct. What evidence supports each interpretation?

6. There are groups in the United States today that actively seek to maintain an identity outside the mainstream culture: the Amish, the Mennonites, Native American tribes, and the Hasidic Jewish community. What benefits do these groups expect from defining themselves as “other”? What are the disadvantages? How does the mainstream culture put pressure on such groups?

7. Lois Lowry helps create an alternate world by having the community use words in a special way. Though that world stresses what it calls “precision of language,” in fact it is built upon language that is not precise but deliberately clouds meaning. What is the danger of such misleading language?

8. Examine the ways in which Jonas’s community uses euphemism to distance itself from the reality of “Release.” How does our own society use euphemism to distance us from such realities as aging and death, bodily functions, and political activities? What are the benefits and disadvantages of such uses of language?

1. We so often think of ourselves as more socially advanced than Middle Eastern nations. What does it say about this assumption that the author was treated by a preacher husband in the US the same way that Nahhida, wife of a Taliban member, is treated in Afghanistan?

2. Did Debbie take a chance of repeating her abusive history by marrying a relatively unknown man from a culture with a reputation for mistreating women?

3. Were you shocked when she revealed that her husband had another wife?

4. Why do you think Debbie was so emotional upon meeting Sam's father? Would you have been eager to meet him or preferred not to? Were you surprised at his reaction?

5. As a mother of two, was Debbie irresponsible in taking risks like crossing the Khyber pass and confronting her neighbors? Should she have gone to Afghanistan at all, knowing the conditions in the country?

6. Debbie's "bad" neighbors were potentially dangerous. What would you have done in her situation? How would the ineffectiveness of the local police make you feel?

7. Was it foolish for Debbie to continue running the beauty school in the face of government interference and hostility?

8. Debbie goes to Afghanistan in order to change the lives of women there and give them greater power in their personal lives, a mission that she has fulfilled for many women. How have these women changed her?

9. Does the example of a strong self-sufficient woman Debbie sets for the Afghan women provide them with helpful inspiration or does it set a dangerous precedent, encouraging them to model behaviors and aspirations that might be dangerous to them in their environment?

10. Would you have let a known Taliban member, and opium addict at that, stay under your roof in order to help his wife? How dangerous do you think this decision really was?

11. Why do you think Hama was unable to follow through and accept the generous offer of a place to live and a new life in the US?

12. How would you have reacted if your son offered to marry Hama? Would you have encouraged him? Argued against it?

13. How do you think American women are similar to and, at the same time, different from the Afghan women Debbie befriended and works with?

14. Did it surprise you to read about some of the frank discussions and depictions of sex among the Afghan women at the beauty salon and the wedding that Debbie attended?

15. Do you think it was wise for Debbie to help Roshanna escape detection as a non-virgin on her wedding night? Would you have chosen to interfere? Why or why not?

1. In addition to her sense of humor and intelligence, what are Tassie's strengths as a narrator? How does what she describes as “an unseemly collection of jostling former selves” (p. 63) affect the narrative and contribute to the appeal of her tale?

2. In the farming community where Tassie grew up, her father “seemed a vaguely contemptuous character. . . . His idiosyncrasies appeared to others to go beyond issues of social authenticity and got into questions of God and man and existence” (p. 19). Does the family, either intentionally or inadvertently, perpetuate their standing as outsiders? How does Moore use what ordinarily might be seen as clichés and stereotypes to create believable and sympathetic portraits of both the locals and the Keltjin family?

3. How does the initial meeting between Tassie and Sarah (pp. 10-24) create a real, if hesitant, connection between them? What aspects of their personalities come out in their conversation? To what extent are their impressions of each other influenced by their personal needs, both practical and psychological?

4. Are Sarah's ill-chosen comments at the meetings with Amber (p. 32) and Bonnie (pp. 89-90, p. 93) the result of the natural awkwardness between a birth mother and a potential adoptive mother or do they reveal deeper insecurities in Sarah? Does the adoption process inevitably involve a certain amount of willful deception, unenforceable promises (p. 87), and a “ceremony of approval . . . [that is] as with all charades. . . . wanly ebullient, necessary, and thin” (p. 95)?

5. What is the significance of Tassie's first impression of Edward-“one could see it was his habit to almost imperceptibly dominate and insult”-and her realization that “[d]espite everything, [Sarah] was in love with him” (p. 91)? Does Edward's behavior at dinner and the “small conspiracy” he and Tassie establish (pp. 112-114) offer a more sympathetic (or at least more understandable) view of him? Are there other passages in the novel that bring out the contradictions between his outward behavior and his private thoughts?

6. Does A Gate at the Stairs accurately reflect the persistence of racism in America? What do the comments and encounters sprinkled throughout in the novel (pp. 80, 112, 151, 167, 229) show about the various forms racism takes in our society?

7. Do you agree with Sarah's statement, “Racial blindness-now there's a very white idea” (p. 86)? What do the discussions in Sarah's support group (pp. 154-57; 186-90; 194-97) reveal about the different perceptions of reality held by African-Americans and white liberals? What role do class, wealth, and professional status play in opinions expressed by various members of the group? In this context, what is the import of Tassie's description of Mary-Emma's affection for Reynaldo: “the colorblindness of small children is a myth; she noticed difference and sameness, with almost equal interest; there was no 'Dilemma of Difference' as my alliteration-loving professors occasionally put it” (p. 169)?

8. How would you characterize the comments about religion throughout the novel (pp. 41, 108, 129)? What is the significance of the fact that Tassie's mother is Jewish, a woman of “indeterminate ethnicity” in a churchgoing community? Why are Roberta Marshall and Sarah so cavalier about Bonnie's insistence that her child be raised as a Catholic (p. 87)? How do Reynaldo's revelations about his activities and beliefs (pp. 204-8) fit into Tassie's view of God and religion in general? On page 296, Tassie offers a thoughtful explanation of the purpose of religion in people's lives. Are there other lessons about the meaning of religion or faith to be found in the novel?

9. The title of the book comes from a ballad Tassie writes with her roommate (p. 219-20). What does music-playing the bass and singing to Mary-Emma-represent to Tassie? How does it connect her to her own family and to Mary-Emma?

10. Does the novel prepare you for Sarah's dreadful confession (pp. 232-242)? What particular incidents or conversations foreshadow the revelations? How do Sarah's “conventional” beliefs about men and women affect the couple's behavior during and after the tragedy (pp. 240, 244)? Was their decision to move and start anew the best solution under the circumstances? Do the reasons Sarah gives for remaining with Edward make emotional sense? If they had been able to keep their secret hidden, would they have been able to create a happy future with Mary-Emma?

11. Nannies and other household help often grasp things families don't realize about themselves. Is Tassie an objective chronicler of life in the Brink-Thornwood household? What biases does she bring to her observations? How do her perceptions and opinions change over the course of the novel? In what ways does her growing attachment to Mary-Emma and her relationship with Sarah account for these changes? In what ways are they attributable to the developments in her personal life?

12. How do the vignettes of Tassie's visits home and her life in Troy play off one another? What do Tassie's conversations with her family bring out about the ambivalence she (and many college students) experience? Why does Tassie fail to recognize the depth of Robert's pain and confusion? Is Robert's decision to join the army given the attention it deserves by the rest of the family?

13. Does the Midwestern setting of the novel offer a distinctive perspective on September 11, 2001, and the mood of the country? How were the events experienced in other parts of America-for example, in the cities directly affected by the terrorist attacks?

14. Lorrie Moore has been widely praised for her affecting depictions of human vulnerability and her dark humor. How does Moore integrate clever one-liners, puns, and wordplay into the serious themes she is exploring? What role does humor play in exposing the thoughts, feelings, and fears the characters are unwilling or unable to express? Does it heighten the emotional force of the novel or diminish it?

15. “I had also learned that in literature-perhaps as in life-one had to speak not of what the author intended but of what a story intended for itself” (p. 263-64]. How does this quotation apply to your reading of A Gate at the Stairs?

1. In the outset of Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand, the Major is described as feeling the weight of his age, but on page 320, the morning after his romantic evening with Mrs. Ali at Colonel Preston’s Lodge, Simonson writes that “a pleasant glow, deep in his gut, was all that remained of a night that seemed to have burned away the years from his back.” Love is not only for the young and, as it did the Major, it has the capacity to revitalize. Discuss the agelessness of love, and how it can transform us at any point in our lives.

2. A crucial theme of Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand is that of obligation. What are the differences between the Pettigrews’ familial expectations and those of the Alis’? What do different characters in the novel have to sacrifice in order to stay true to these obligations? What do they give up in diverging from them?

3. Major Pettigrew clings to the civility of a bygone era, and his discussions with Mrs. Ali over tea are a narrative engine of the book and play a central role in their burgeoning romance. In our digital world, how have interpersonal relationships changed? Do you think instant communication makes us more or less in touch with the people around us?

4. Much of the novel focuses on the notion of “otherness.” Who is considered an outsider in Edgecombe St. Mary? How are the various village outsiders treated differently?

5. First impressions in Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand can be deceiving. Discuss the progressions of the characters you feel changed the most from the beginning of the book to the end.

6. The Major struggles to find footing in his relationship with his adult son, Roger. Discuss the trickiness of being a parent to an adult child, and alternatively, an adult child to an aging parent. How does the generation gap come to impact the relationship?

7. Major Pettigrew and Mrs. Ali connect emotionally in part because they share the experience of having lost a spouse, and in part because they delight in love having come around a second time. How do you think relationships formed in grief are different from those that are not?

8. For Major Pettigrew, the Churchills represent societal standing and achievement, as well as an important part of his family’s history. However, as events unfold, the Major begins to question whether loyalty and honor are more important than material objects and social status. Discuss the evolving importance of the guns to the Major, as well as the challenge of passing down important objects, and values, to younger generations.

1. Just as she did with time travel in The Time Traveler's Wife, Audrey Niffenegger made the bold choice to center the story in Her Fearful Symmetry around a fantastical subject: ghosts. How does Niffenegger strive to make this supernatural occurrence believable in the novel? Do you think she succeeds? Why do you think Niffenegger is attracted to subjects like time travel and ghosts?

2. The book opens with Elspeth's death. Why might this be significant? In Chicago, why is Jack "relieved" when he hears that Elsepth has died? How do Jack's feelings for Elspeth foreshadow events later in the novel?

3. The narrator, in describing the physical appearance of Julia and Valentina, remarks that the twins "might have been cast as Victorian orphans in a made for TV movie." How do the twins appear to the outside world? Why do you think Niffenegger decided to make them beautiful but fragile --- "like dandelions gone to seed?"

4. Before she dies, Elspeth tries to explain to Robert the nature of her relationship with Edie. Elspeth says, "All I can say is, you haven't got a twin, so you can't know how it is." How does Niffenegger depict the bonds between the two sets of twins in the novel? Compare and contrast the relationships between Elspeth and Edie and between Julia and Valentina.

5. In what ways does Valentina live up to her nickname, "Mouse," and in what ways do her actions in the novel contradict it?

6. As she observes Elspeth's funeral procession, Marijke muses that the cemetery is like "an old theater." What does she mean? How does Highgate Cemetery come to function like a character in Her Fearful Symmetry?

7. Martin is an unusual person: a translator of obscure languages and crossword puzzle setter who also suffers from Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Why is it important that he and Julia should become friends? What does their friendship reveal about each other?

8. "A bad thing about dying," Elspeth writes to the twins, "is that I feel I'm being erased." What does she mean by that? How does Elspeth seek to rectify this feeling of "being erased"? Similarly, after Marijke leaves him, Martin worries that his wife is gradually “bleaching out of his memory.” How is the issue of memory important to the characters in Her Fearful Symmetry?

9. One of the pivotal moments in the plot occurs when Robert takes Valentina on their first date. How does their sudden romantic attachment affect Julia and Valentina's relationship? How does it affect Robert? How did you react when you realized that Robert and Valentina might become lovers, and why?

10. Why does Elspeth choose to leave her apartment to Julia and Valentina? At one point, Robert conjectures that “it’s the extravagance of the thing that appealed to her.” Do you agree? How does your opinion of Elspeth change over the course of the novel?

11. Though ghosts figure prominently in the storyline, the characters in the novel spend relatively little time asking themselves about the spiritual implications of their predicament. Why do you think that is?

12. Niffenegger depicts several long-term romantic relationships in Her Fearful Symmetry: Elspeth and Robert; Martin and Marijke; Edie and Jack; as well as Jessica and James Bates. Which, if any, of these relationships is successful, and why?

13. Many of the characters in the novel demonstrate nostalgia for things in the past: Robert with Highgate Cemetery and its history; Martin with mostly forgotten languages; Elspeth with her book collection; and, even Julia and Valentina, with their appreciation of old clothes and television shows. Why do you think Niffenegger includes so many “nostalgic” elements?

14. Niffenegger plays with the idea of "being lost" in at least two ways in the novel. Julia and Valentina are frequently lost in London. When she loses her way, Valentina begins to panic, but Julia "abandons" herself to "lostness." Meanwhile, Robert and Elspeth experience loss as it relates to death. How do these two types of loss play out in the novel? Are they somehow related?

15. The title Her Fearful Symmetry is derived from a poem written in 1794 by William Blake, “The Tyger.” Look up the poem online, and read it. Why do you think Niffenegger chose this title? How do you think she intends for readers to understand the word “fearful”?

 1. In the opening scene, an unknown narrator makes his first appearance. Were you surprised that his story wove throughout the rest of the narrative? How would the novel have been different had this not happened? Did you know who the narrator was? When did you know?

2. The novel deals with the theme of love and forgiveness. How were the major characters -- Miles, Sarah, Brian, Charlie, and Jonah -- forgiven? How did love play a role? What else played a role? Is forgiveness and act, or is forgiveness and on-going process? Explain.

3. New Bern is described in detail. How does the setting play a role in the story? Could this story have occurred in a larger city? Why or why not?

4. Miles lost his first love and yet he's ready to move on by the time he meets Sarah. Does Miles believe in the idea of eternal love?

5. Sarah is a wounded character when the novel opens because she can't have children. How does Jonah influence the relationship between Miles and Sarah? Would they still have fallen in love had Jonah not been around?

6. In this novel, there are scenes that take place in the cemetery. What is the significance of the cemetery in this story? How does it play into the theme of the novel?

7. Miles watches family home videos in the privacy of his home but refuses to share them with Jonah. Think about the memories that Miles has of Missy. What is Miles's vision of Missy and how does that play a role in how he views Sarah?

8. Charlie plays a central role in the investigation and is Miles's boss. He also plays a central role in Miles's life as a father figure. What is there relationship like? How does Charlie view Miles? How does Miles view Charlie? Is this typical of father/son relationships?

9. Describe Jonah's character. Is he believable as a young child?

1. On the first page, Miss Gussie states, ³There is so much good in a garden, if you don¹t count what happened to Adam and Eve.² How does this statement serve as a foreshadowing of events to come and as a metaphor for the story as a whole? Why does West choose to begin and end the novel in Miss Gussie¹s garden?

2. What is the significance of Miss Gussie¹s act of murder in the first chapter? Why would West choose to open the story with this scene?

3. Both Dorothy and Clancy Jane have self-destructive tendencies that lead each to the brink of suicide. Why? What in their shared experience could lead to this behavior?

4. West uses multiple narrators to unfold the story in Crazy Ladies. What advantages are gained by this? How does the perspective of each of the six women affect your experience of the story? Do multiple narrators help to temper your judgments toward a character?

5. Clancy Jane is the most free-spirited character, and her life is filled with experiences that none of the other women ever share or understand. How does her character serve to expand the range and depth of the novel? What could her experiences teach the other women?

6. One of the dominant themes of Crazy Ladies is that of the single mother. How well do Clancy Jane, Dorothy, and Bitsy handle their issues of abandonment and the challenges of raising their children alone. What is West saying about the fortitude of women?

7. By the end of the novel, Queenie has become the most stable and secure characters. Were you surprised by this? Was there any foreshadowing of this in the novel¹s beginning?

1.  Describe Tessa's relationship with her father. How has this relationship been shaped by Tessa's illness? Debate whether Cal, Tessa's younger brother, feels neglected by his father. Discuss Tessa's relationship with her mother. Why did she leave home? When does Tessa miss her mother the most?

2.  Discuss the true qualities of a friend. Which of these qualities best describes Tessa and Zoey's friendship? What does Zoey offer Tessa that her father cannot give? Why does Tessa's father call Zoey when Tessa won't get out of bed? Cal hates Zoey. How does Tessa explain her friendship with Zoey to her little brother?

3.  Tessa's father is frustrated when she becomes withdrawn. He says, "If you won't talk about it, how can I help?" (p. 2) How does this withdrawal represent the first stage of grief? Why is talking about feelings always better than keeping them to yourself?

4.  Discuss why Tessa doesn't want to return to school. She says that Zoey is the only person at school that isn't afraid of her illness. Explain how difficult it is for teenagers to deal with the terminal illness of a classmate. What might Zoey say to other students that would help them know how to interact with Tessa?

5.  Tessa writes her private thoughts on the wall beside her bed. Why does she let Zoey read what she has written?

6.  Zoey tells Tessa that it's all right to be afraid. How does Tessa reveal her fear? How does she use her hat to hide her fear? Discuss how Cal, Adam and Tessa's father express their fear.

7.  How is Tessa's list a form of bargaining and acceptance? At what point in the novel does Tessa accept the fact that she is dying? Explain how her list helps her "get on with living." Which item on her list is the most dangerous? Why does doing illegal things like shoplifting and driving without a license give Tessa a thrill?

8.  Tessa's father wants to know the things on her list. He says, "I need to know about it, not because I want to stop you, but because I want to keep you safe." (p. 80) Discuss how Tessa reacts to her father when he asks to see the list.

9.  Discuss the conversation between Tessa and her father after she is caught shoplifting. Why does he think anger is taking her over?

10. How is Tessa's list confusing to her father? Explain how Tessa's list is self-centered. Her mum tells her, "You have to think about the people who love you." (p. 170) At what point does Tessa begin to think about Cal and her father? Explain why Tessa's mother speaks in past tense when she says, "we loved you." Why is it unrealistic for Tessa to think that she can rekindle her parents' relationship?

11. Why do you think sex is number one on Tessa's list of things she wants to do before she dies? Tessa worries about being a "slag" if she has sex with someone that she doesn't know. Explain Zoey's reaction to Tessa's thoughts.

12. Tessa says that walking up the stairs behind a boy she doesn't know reminds her of hospital corridors. What do the stairs and the corridors symbolize?

13. Discuss the moments in the novel that Tessa is most depressed. Who helps her deal with her depression?

14. Why does Zoey suspect that Tessa is in love with Adam? What does Zoey mean when she says, "I thought you understood the rules! Never let a bloke into your heart–it's fatal"? (p. 88) Why is Adam different than Zoey? Discuss what Adam means when he says, "I can't give you what you want." (p. 117) What does he ultimately give her? What does she offer him?

15. Tessa asks the home health care nurse if she believes in God. What is the significance of this inquiry? Tessa tells the nurse that she doesn't believe in heaven. Discuss the nurse's reaction to Tessa's confession. Why does the nurse think a support group might be helpful to Tessa? How does Tessa's list take the place of a support group?

16. How does Tessa's dad react when he finds out Zoey wants to terminate her pregnancy? Discuss how his opinion is related to Tessa's terminal illness.

17. Depression, loneliness, anxiety, and guilt are emotions associated with grief. How does each of the characters in the novel deal with these emotions?

1. Gilbert writes that “the appreciation of pleasure can be the anchor of humanity,” making the argument that America is “an entertainment-seeking nation, not necessarily a pleasure-seeking one.” Is this a fair assessment?

2. After imagining a petition to God for divorce, an exhausted Gilbert answers her phone to news that her husband has finally signed. During a moment of quietude before a Roman fountain, she opens her Louise Glück collection to a verse about a fountain, one reminiscent of the Balinese medicine man’s drawing. After struggling to master a 182-verse daily prayer, she succeeds by focusing on her nephew, who suddenly is free from nightmares. Do these incidents of fortuitous timing signal fate? Cosmic unity? Coincidence?

3. Gilbert hashes out internal debates in a notebook, a place where she can argue with her inner demons and remind herself about the constancy of self-love. When an inner monologue becomes a literal conversation between a divided self, is this a sign of last resort or of self-reliance?

4. When Gilbert finally returns to Bali and seeks out the medicine man who foretold her return to study with him, he doesn’t recognize her. Despite her despair, she persists in her attempts to spark his memory, eventually succeeding. How much of the success of Gilbert’s journey do you attribute to persistence?

5. Prayer and meditation are both things that can be learned and, importantly, improved. In India, Gilbert learns a stoic, ascetic meditation technique. In Bali, she learns an approach based on smiling. Do you think the two can be synergistic? Or is Ketut Liyer right when he describes them as “same-same”?

6. Gender roles come up repeatedly in Eat, Pray, Love, be it macho Italian men eating cream puffs after a home team’s soccer loss, or a young Indian’s disdain for the marriage she will be expected to embark upon at age eighteen, or the Balinese healer’s sly approach to male impotence in a society where women are assumed responsible for their childlessness. How relevant is Gilbert’s gender?

7. In what ways is spiritual success similar to other forms of success? How is it different? Can they be so fundamentally different that they’re not comparable?

8. Do you think people are more open to new experiences when they travel?  And why?

9. Abstinence in Italy seems extreme, but necessary, for a woman who has repeatedly moved from one man’s arms to another’s. After all, it’s only after Gilbert has found herself that she can share herself fully in love. What does this say about her earlier relationships?

10. Gilbert mentions her ease at making friends, regardless of where she is. At one point at the ashram, she realizes that she is too sociable and decides to embark on a period of silence, to become the Quiet Girl in the Back of the Temple. It is just after making this decision that she is assigned the role of ashram key hostess. What does this say about honing one’s nature rather than trying to escape it? Do you think perceived faults can be transformed into strengths rather than merely repressed?

11. Sitting in an outdoor café in Rome, Gilbert’s friend declares that every city --- and every person --- has a word. Rome’s is “sex,” the Vatican’s “power”; Gilbert declares New York’s to be “achieve,” but only later stumbles upon her own word, antevasin, Sanskrit for “one who lives at the border.” What is your word? Is it possible to choose a word that retains its truth for a lifetime?

1. In his introductory note Yann Martel says, "This book was born as I was hungry." What sort of emotional nourishment might Life of Pi have fed to its author?

2. Pondicherry is described as an anomaly, the former capital of what was once French India. In terms of storytelling, what makes this town an appropriate choice for Pi's upbringing?

3. Yann Martel recalls that many Pondicherry residents provided him with stories, but he was most intrigued by this tale because Mr. Adirubasamy said it would make him believe in God. Did Pi's tale alter your beliefs about God?

4. Early in the novel, we discover that the narrator majored in religious studies and zoology, with particular interests in a sixteenth-century Kabbalist and the admirable three-toed sloth. In subsequent chapters, he explains the ways in which religions and zoos are both steeped in illusion. Discuss some of the other ways in which these two fields find unlikely compatibility.

5. Yann Martel sprinkles the novel with italicized memories of the "real" Pi Patel and wonders in his author's note whether fiction is "the selective transforming of reality, the twisting of it to bring out its essence." If this is so, what is the essence of Pi?

6. Pi's full name, Piscine Molitor Patel, was inspired by a Parisian swimming pool that "the gods would have delighted to swim in." The shortened form refers to the ratio of a circle's circumference divided by its diameter. Explore the significance of Pi's unusual name.

7. One reviewer said the novel contains hints of The Old Man and the Sea, and Pi himself measures his experience in relation to history's most famous castaways. Considering that Pi's shipwreck is the first to focus on a boy and his tiger, how does Life of Pi compares to other maritime novels and films?

8. How might the novel's flavor have been changed if Pi's sole surviving animal were the zebra or Orange Juice? (We assume that if the hyena had been the only surviving animal, Pi would not have lived to tell us his story.)

9. In chapter 23, Pi sparks a lively debate when all three of his spiritual advisors try to claim him. At the heart of this confrontation is Pi's insistence that he cannot accept an exclusively Hindu, Christian, or Muslim faith; he can only be content with all three. What is Pi seeking that can solely be attained by this apparent contradiction?

10. What do you make of Pi's assertion at the beginning of chapter 16 that we are all "in limbo, without religion, until some figure introduces us to God"? Do you believe that Pi's piousness was a response to his father's atheism?

11. Among Yann Martel's gifts is a rich descriptive palette. Regarding religion, he observes the green elements that represent Islam and the orange tones of Hinduism. What color would Christianity be, according to Pi's perspective?

12. How do the human beings in your world reflect the animal behavior observed by Pi? What do Pi's strategies for dealing with Richard Parker teach us about confronting the fearsome creatures in our lives?

13. Besides the loss of his family and possessions, what else did Pi lose when the Tsimtsum sank? What did he gain?

14. Nearly everyone experiences a turning point that represents the transition from youth to adulthood, albeit seldom as traumatic as Pi's. What event marks your coming of age?

15. How do Mr. Patel's zookeeping abilities compare to his parenting skills? Discuss the scene in which his tries to teach his children a lesson in survival by arranging for them to watch a tiger devour a goat. Did this in any way prepare Pi for the most dangerous experience of his life?

16. Why did Pi at first try so hard to save Richard Parker?

17. Pi imagines that his brother would have teasingly called him Noah. How does Pi's voyage compare to the biblical story of Noah, who was spared from the flood while God washed away the sinners?

18. Is Life of Pi a tragedy, romance, or comedy?

19. Do you agree with Pi's opinion that a zoo is more like a suburb than a jail?

20. How did you react to Pi's interview by the Japanese transport ministers? Did you ever believe that Pi's mother, along with a sailor and a cannibalistic cook, had perhaps been in the lifeboat with him instead of the animals? How does Yann Martel achieve such believability in his surprising plots?

21. The opening scene occurs after Pi's ordeal has ended. Discussing his work in the first chapter, Pi says that a necktie is a noose, and he mentions some of the things that he misses about India (in spite of his love for Canada). Would you say that this novel has a happy ending? How does the grown-up version of Pi contrast with his little-boy scenes?

1. In what ways can Eunice be described as an unconventional woman ahead of her time? In what ways can she be described as a conventional woman caught up in her own time?

2. Other than Eunice, which historical actor or actors did you find yourself most drawn to or interested in? For whom did you feel sympathy or antipathy? Did your feelings toward various family members change over the course of the narrative?

3. What surprised you most about the daily lives and labor of working-class women and families in nineteenth-century America?

4. Most historians and biographers choose to write about well-known people from the past. What is the value of writing about a completely ordinary and unknown person? 

5. Imagine Eunice herself reading The Sea Captain’s Wife. What might she think of the way Hodes shaped her story and the meanings Hodes found within her life?

6. Eunice wrote to her mother: “I write you a good many letters that I dont send. When I feel lonesome and bad as if I must see you, I set down and write, then the next day burn them up.” Imagine some of the contents of the letters Eunice burned. If the author could find just one more letter from Eunice, what subject or question would you most hope it would address or explain?

7. The Civil War acts as a catalyst to much of Eunice’s story, including her experiences in the, and many of her losses.  What larger aspects of the Civil War did Eunice's story illuminate for you?

8. Hodes writes that "In her voyages from New England to the Deep South to the British Caribbean, Eunice also mad a journey from the life of an impoverished white woman in the United States to the life of an elite woman of color in the West Indies."  Hodes also notes that "In New England, Smilye was not a white man, but in the West Indies, he was not a black man.” What do these episodes of ambiguous or changeable racial definitions tell you about the larger concept of race?

9. In her letters, Eunice often conveyed the precariousness of life by invoking the common nineteenth-century phrases “if nothing happens” and “if I live.” Are there ways in which these phrases resonate for you in the present day?

10. What if Eunice had refused Smiley Connolly’s proposal of marriage? Speculate about what turns her life might have taken if she had remained unmarried or if she had married a white man of lesser means.

11. Hodes employs a number of unconventional forms for a work of nonfiction. She renders Eunice’s words in italic type and without quotation marks as a way to integrate Eunice’s perspective “more seamlessly into the story.” She also opens each of the book’s core chapters with a single complete letter written by Eunice, in order to “give readers a sense of Eunice’s voice” and includes a photograph of the first page of each of these letters. As a reader, how did you respond to these literary strategies?

12. Hodes invokes two epigraphs in The Sea Captain’s Wife. At the outset she quotes Emily Dickinson: “I’m Nobody! Who are you? / Are you—Nobody—Too?” and toward the end she quotes T. S. Eliot: “These are only hints and guesses, / Hints followed by guesses.” Why do you think Hodes chose these lines? What meanings do you find in them for Eunice’s story?

13. Hodes visited the various places where Eunice lived and describes them as they appear in the present day. Hodes also found descendants of the Richardson and Connolly families in the course of her research. How do these forays into the present day affect the story of the past that Hodes tells in The Sea Captain’s Wife?

14. How would you describe the author’s voice in The Sea Captain’s Wife? What does Hodes’s voice convey about her relationship to Eunice?

15. At the book’s outset, we learn that Eunice drowned in a hurricane. How did this early revelation affect your experience of reading the book? How did you feel when you came to this episode again, at the end?

16. In interviews, Hodes has said that the advantage of writing Eunice’s story as nonfiction is that everything in the book is true. Still, what would be gained if Hodes had written this book as a novel? What would be lost?

17. If you were to write and direct a film based on The Sea Captain’s Wife, how would you structure the movie? Which actors would you ask to play the different characters?

18. Did Eunice inspire you in any way? Did she disappoint you in any way? In what ways does Eunice’s story feel meaningful for the twenty-first century? 

1.  It seems that Carrie doesn't come alive until literally everyone around her is dying. Why do you think it took her home being taken over by the Confederate Army and turned into a hospital to awaken Carrie out of her stupor?

2.  Do you believe that Zachariah really wanted to die when he picked up the colors on the battlefield? Why does Nathan Stiles spare Zachariah on the battlefield specifically, when others carrying the colors were killed? Is Zachariah grateful to be spared, or is he regretful, or a little of both, and why?

3.  Does John McGavock undergo a character transformation from the beginning of the novel, when he and Theopolis encounter the gang of ruffians in the woods, to the end, when we see scenes him of him wandering around Franklin somewhat aimlessly? How do you think he views the war? How do you think he views his role, or his non-role, in the war? And how does this compare with Carrie's attitude towards the war?

4.  In the author's note Robert Hicks says of Mariah, "… I have concluded that Mariah may well have been the most complete human of them all." Mariah never let her enslavement define her. Do you agree?
 
5.  Discuss how the death of their children affected both Carrie and John. What is the difference between the attachment mothers and fathers have with their children? Do you think John would have begun drinking whether his children had died or not? And do you think Carrie had a propensity for eccentricity and seclusion?

6.  When Carrie first notices Zachariah in her upstairs guest room, she remarks: "Unlike most of the men, he looked ready to die. He looked as if he were welcoming it, urging it along…I wanted his eyes on me." Why does Carrie take to Zachariah, and why does she later give him special treatment? Do you think it was purely physical attraction? Does Zachariah's welcoming of his own death conflict with Carrie's values?

7.  Faith plays a large part in each character's motivations. Discuss the role of belief in a higher power and how it guides Carrie, Zachariah, and Mariah in their actions. For most of us, our belief system changes or 'grows' over the span of our lives, one way or the other. How did Carrie's faith change over the span of the novel?

8.  Why do you think Carrie beats Zachariah on the porch? Were you surprised by this or did you understand it?

9.  Zachariah and Carrie have an intense love affair yet it's never consummated sexually. Do you think the fact they never were physically intimate takes away or adds to their relationship, or does it matter?

10. At one point Carrie tells Mariah, "You always could have left, even when you weren't allowed. I would have never stopped you." Do you think this is true? Carrie seems to think of Mariah as her best friend, but she was really her property, a "gift" her father gave to her as a child. Do you think Carrie tries to make herself appear a better friend/owner than she really was? Discuss Carrie and Mariah's relationship. Could friendship really transcend enslavement?

11. Among the political issues leading up to the Civil War was the South's strong adherence to the doctrine of 'state's rights.' Among the issues to come out of the war was the emancipation of the enslaved in the 'slave states,' whether they had remained loyal to the union or had seceded and joined the Confederacy. Yet, neither of these political issues is ever addressed 'head-on' in the book. Why do you think that is?

12. Carrie comes from a rich, educated family. She is "learned." Zachariah is poor, and almost illiterate. Yet do you think one is wiser than the other?

13. Robert Hicks has said, "good writing is about transformation." We see transformation in Carrie, Zachariah and in their relationship, in John, in his and Carrie's relationship, in Mariah and her relationship with Carrie. Are we left with any sense that Mr. Baylor ever comes to any real peace about what has happened?

14. What does Carrie mean when she says the following to Zachariah: "You are my key. You will explain things I have not been able to understand…I want you to explain to me why I wanted you to live and why I was able to make you live. Because I don't understand, not really, and the answer is very important to me." What is Carrie not able to understand about herself, and what answer does she think Zachariah will be able to provide?

15. Carrie takes Eli into her home and he quickly assumes the role of a surrogate son and Winder's surrogate brother. How do Carrie's actions speak to her changing perceptions of family? Has her work running the hospital changed her maternal instincts or is she simply responding to the nature of war?

16. At the town party, Carrie remarks about how she doesn't fit in with the other women; Mrs. McEwen pokes fun of her efforts and jokingly calls her "St. 17. In 1894, after John has died, and Mariah, Carrie and Zachariah are all elderly, why does Zachariah not profess his love for Carrie more overtly? Over time, did his love become more of respect and admiration for her heroism, or are his feelings for her just as romantically intense?

1.  One of the most uniques aspects of this novel is its ability to take the reader directly into the live of the student-heroes Tom and Paul (as well as Gil and Charlie), and then in a sentence place readers in the middle of Renaissance intrigue.  Did you think tensions among the Princeton students and their mentors and rivals mirror those of the men centuries ago protecting the secrets? How were the conflicts similar, or different? Did you find that these character relationships drove the narrative as much as the decoding of the fascinating book, the Hypnerotomachia Poliphili (pronounced Hip-ner-AH-toe-mak-ee-a Poh-LI-fi-ly)?

2. The authors, Caldwell and Thomason, have been close friends since they were eight-years-old. Why is this important to the book?

3. What are Tom's and Paul's motivation for pursuing the secrets of the Hypnerotomachia? In what way is Tom fulfilling his own needs by alternately obsessing himself with and then ignoring the messages of the text? Did you find the father/son story moving, and in what way do the relationships we have with the people we love or admire drive our ambitions or destroy our dreams? How is Paul different from Tom?

4. In what ways are the worlds of Paul, Tom, Tom's father, his old colleagues and foes as cut-throat and deadly as that of the anonymous writer of the Hypnerotomachia? How does the conflict of ideas become deadly? Why is the Robert Browning poem entitled "Andrea Del Sarto" that is slightly misquoted by one character, and later referenced by Paul in a critical scene, a statement about motive?

5. After the first death on campus, did you suspect who the murderer was? Were you correct?

6. What part of the code-breaking did you find most interesting? Did you "beat" Paul or Tom to a conclusion as they unraveled some of the mystery? Did you agree with the characters' conclusions? Could you understand the mesmerizing effect that a book or work of art could have on a person? Have you ever felt this pull? In what way is it exhilarating?

7. Tom's and Katie's relationship suffers as the mysteries come to a head. Did this seem natural to you? Did you find the resolution of their relationship realistic?

8. At a critical moment in the novel, Paul says "I don't want to do this alone." What does this say about the nature of his specific quest, and intellectual puzzles in general? Why is the sharing of the result so important to him?

9. The action of the novel begins on Good Friday; three days later, on Easter, it ends (saving the postscript). Is this important? What might the authors be saying using this specific timeframe?

10. At the heart of the Hypnerotomachia may be a crusade to save works of art and literature from the ancient, mostly pagan world --- a world considered infidel by some of the zealous contemporaries of the anonymous author. Why would the cause have been important? What was at stake? And if such a covert rescue operation had occurred, is it possible that it could have been kept secret for 500 years? How so? If you could uncover something in an undisturbed crypt, hidden away for centuries and untouched, what would you most want to discover?

11. In early praise for The Rule of Four admirers have compared the authors' work to that of F.Scott Fitzgerald (The Great Gatsby, etc.), Dan Brown (The Da Vinci Code, etc.) Umberto Eco (The Name Of the Rose, etc.) and Donna Tartt (The Secret History, etc.). Are these comparisons apt? How? What other works of suspense and literature did this novel call to your mind? Could you see it as a film?

12. What is the rule of four?

1. After the conversation with her father about "almost moons," Helen says, "I knew I was supposed to understand something from my father's explanation, but what I came away with was that, just as we were stuck with the moon, so too we were stuck with my mother" (page 134). What did Helen's father intend to say with his example of "almost moons"? Did you think his metaphor was apt?

2. The Almost Moon opens with a startling confession. After the first several pages, why did you think Helen killed her mother? Did you feel sympathy for her at that point? As you learned more about Helen's relationship with her mother -- and her mother's overall mental state -- did your feelings about Helen change? Did you think she was more justified to act as she did, or did you lose sympathy for her?

3. In chapters two through four and chapter eleven, Helen flashes back to memories from her past. In the first section, she is slowly removing her mother's clothes to bathe her. In the second, she is posing for art students. What do you think Sebold is implying about the relationship of the body to memory? Can you think of other instances in the text when the tactile leads Helen into a greater understanding or awareness of her past or that of another?

4. What motivated Daniel to stay with Clair for all those years? Do you think his bouts of depression stemmed from a difficult home situation, or did he have larger issues? Should he have taken his daughter and left his wife—for Helen's sake, if not for his own -- or did he do the right thing by taking care of his wife so that she wouldn't have to be in an institution? How much do we owe to those we love or have married?

5. What moves Helen to seek a physical connection with Hamish? Did you think their interaction was more than just physical? Was their relationship troubling to you, and was Natalie right to be angered by it?

6. Helen's two daughters, Emily and Sarah, are very different from each other, at one point reminding Helen of polarized magnets (page 80). Helen also tells Jake that "You left the girls. . . . I may not have been perfect, but I didn't take off. . . ." (page 167). Do you think Helen was a good mother? Was she a better mother to Sarah than to Emily? How do you feel her daughters would respond to that question?

7. In chapter nine, Helen seeks refuge with Mr. Forrest, who provides her an escape from her house. What is the significance to her of the illuminated manuscripts he collects? How does this visit change her view of her own life?

8. When they meet, Jake is Helen's teacher, and she is his muse. What causes them to drift apart and divorce? When he returns, how has their relationship changed?

9. In chapter twelve, Helen's father takes her to Lambeth, where he shows her the remains of his old house. What is the significance of the plywood people? Do they mean different things to Helen and to her father? Why does he select these particular moments of his life to commemorate? And does the town having been unsuccessfully "drowned" reflect any other situations in the novel?

10. How did you interpret the ending of the novel? What is the best way for Helen to make amends or atone for what she did? Or is there no way for her to make things right?