Death in Her Hands (Moshfegh) - Discussion Questions

Discussion Questions
We'll add publisher questions if and when they're available; in the meantime, use our LitLovers talking points to help start a discussion for DEATH IN HER HANDS … then take off on your own:

1. When Vesta Gul finds the note about a murder that kicks this narrative off, why doesn't she call the police? What would you have done?

2. How does Vesta come up with "Blake," the supposed identity of the supposed murderer? Does she use random association, research, logic, imagination? Is the author poking fun at mystery novels?

3. What do we come to learn about Vesta as she begins to determine the plot and characters of her "murder mystery"? Is she writing a mystery… or living within one?

4. Talk about Vesta's marriage to her late husband, Walter Gul. What kind of man was Walter?

5. Vest recalls how Walter playing chess with himself--that by switching chairs, as he told her, "the psyche confronts itself.” He goes on: "The mind must be spoken to, Vesta, otherwise it starts to atrophy.” Vesta doesn't buy it: "But if the mind talks to itself… isn’t it just saying what it wants to hear?” Is Vesta suggesting that our attempts to understand our own lives and selves are simply efforts in delusion or illusion? Does this rule apply to Vesta herself?

6. At what point do you come to think that Ottessa Moshfegh is writing a novel within a novel. Or is she? How do you untangle this?

7. Is any of this real? Has Vesta dreamed all of this? Has she even fabricated Walter? What about her dog Charlie? Does he exist?

8. Is this book a mindfuck?
(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online and off, with attribution. Thanks.)

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