Discussion Questions
Use our LitLovers Book Club Resources; they can help with discussions for any book:
• How to Discuss a Book (helpful discussion tips)
• Generic Discussion Questions—Fiction and Nonfiction
• Read-Think-Talk (a guided reading chart)
Also consider these LitLovers talking points to help get a discussion started for The Scent of Rosa's Oil:
1. In what way does Simoni turn the conventional assumption about prostitues and "witches" on its head?
2. Should Madam C have kep Rosa from understanding the real "game" / business of Luna? Is there a difference between naivete and innocence? Can you have one without the other? Today, we try to protect our children from adult "knowledge" of the world. Is it possible to over protect them?
3. Was it smart or right of Rosa to deceive Renato by with-holding her upbringing from him and disguising herself? Or did she do it out of necessity? Are we less judgmental today, or do we continue to judge others according to their back-grounds. In other words, do we still believe that that the sins of the parent are visited upon the child? (Be honest, now.)
4. How is this book similar to those that center on food and its magical properties? Have you read, or know of, other works comparable to The Scent of Rosa's Oil? What might all these works be saying about the power of the senses as opposed to the intellect? Think of it this way: historically, Western culture has considered reason superior to passion—the intellect must control pleasure, i.e., the desire to indulge the senses. How does Simoni's work (and others) challenge that way of thinking?
5. This novel is partly a coming-of-age story, in which the heroine attains maturity and finds her way into the adult world. What does Rosa come to learn by the end of the story? What about Renato?
6. Can you discern the ways in which Simoni portrays the winds of change in this work—a more modern way of viewing the world?
(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)
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