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Discussion Questions
1. Memory plays an important role in Academy Street, and near the beginning of the novel, Tess takes a walk through the grounds of her family’s estate and picks up a rotting apple. The smell takes her back to "the apple room and the apples laid out on newspapers on the floor, turning yellow." Why is memory such an important theme in the novel, and what is it about scent that can bring one back to precise memories?

2. Shortly after the death of her mother, Tess has several interactions with a "tinker girl." What is the significance of this girl and her exchanges with Tess? Why do you think the author included this character?

3. While Tess is mourning her mother, she seeks comfort from Captain, the family dog. Tess feels that "he understands something about her, maybe everything, and her heart begins to open." Why do you think Tess seems to experience more comfort from a dog than one of her family members? And what does it say about Tess’s character that she feels this way? Have you ever had a similar experience with an animal?

4. Shortly before Tess leaves for New York, she finds herself in the kitchen with her father. She offers to cut his hair, and she says that it is in this moment that "she sees for the first time all he has endured." What does this dramatic scene represent for each character?

5. On the day Tess meets David for the first time, she reads a book about Vincent Van Gogh and is moved by the kindness of his brother, Theo. When she is walking down the street to meet her friends she begins to cry for no apparent reason. After, she feels as if she sees things clearly and sees "beauty everywhere." What do you make of this transformation and its significance to the novel?

6. Soon after Tess begins to fall in love with David, she runs into a bag lady on the street "with crazed eyes" and "wild hair" who shouts obscenities at Tess. This incident "shook her to her core." What is it about this particular incident that unsettles Tess so deeply?

7. Was Tess’s decision to sleep with David out of character? Why or why not?

8. When Tess becomes pregnant with Theo, it is the early 1960s and it is not socially acceptable for a woman to be pregnant out of wedlock. Tess describes how she takes to wearing a wedding ring and seats herself near "earnest-looking" men. What would you have done in Tess’s position? And while times have certainly changed, do you think it is truly socially acceptable for single women to have children in our times?

9. Why does Tess have such a hard time writing a reply to the letter Claire sends her after Claire finds out Tess is pregnant?

10. Do you think Tess should have made more of an effort to involve David in Theo’s life after he was born?

11. Tess meets Boris, the older Russian man from the park, for a second time when he is hospitalized. He tells her "There is, in some of us, an essential loneliness.… It is in you." Do you agree with his assessment of Tess? Why or why not?

12. When Theo is about nine or ten, Tess takes him to a friend’s birthday party, and he does not want to leave. Tess is struck by the feeling that he now feels that he’s been denied certain things, and we learn that she never baked Theo a birthday cake and did not take him to the fun places that other children are often taken. Why does Tess deny her son these experiences? Does this make her selfish?

13. Tess and Wilma have a very close relationship, and once, when they are discussing Greek mythology, Tess finds herself sexually attracted to Wilma. Why would the author include this scene, and what does it reflect about the two’s relationship?

14. When Tess learns that the twin towers were hit by planes and Theo was inside, she describes the moment as "the calamity she had always been waiting for. It was almost a relief when it arrived…" Why does Tess feel this way? Do you think it’s an unusual response?

15. Shortly after Theo’s death, Tess presses her fingers into the throat of her cat’s neck until the cat becomes frightened and runs away. What does this scene tells us about the nature of grief?
 (Questions written by Kianoosh Hashemzadeh and issued by the publisher.)

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