The Montclair Sisters
Cathy Holton, 2012
Branwell Books
366 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781938529009
Summary
The last thing twenty-one-year-old Stella Nightingale wants is a job as a caregiver for wealthy Alice Montclair Whittington. Alice, a ninety-four-year-old Southern grande dame with a dry sense of humor and a wicked tongue, has already run off a long line of caregivers.
But Stella, a former runaway from a broken home who's only recently begun to put her life back together, is desperate for work. And she figures she can handle Alice. But strange things are happening at Alice's rambling mountaintop estate. As an unlikely friendship develops between the two women, Alice, whose memory comes and goes, begins to reveal long-ago tales of her illustrious past, tales that pose more questions than they answer. Who is her mysterious sister, Laura? Why won't Alice and her sister, Adeline, ever speak of her? And why are the other caregivers afraid to go down in the basement?
As Stella tries to separate fact from fiction in Alice's life, she struggles to overcome her own devastating family secret, compelled by a deepening friendship that will change the lives of both women forever. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—June 24, 1956
• Where—Lakeland, Florida, USA
• Education—Michigan State University
• Currently—lives in Chattanooga, Tennessee
Cathy Holton, the daughter of a college professor and an artist, grew up in college towns in the American South and Midwest. As a child, she entertained her classmates with tales of a scaled creature that lived in her carport shed and a magical phone that hung in her family’s bathroom that could be used to summon an English butler (this was in North Carolina in the 1960’s and her family lived in married student housing).
Once, in a moment of epiphany, she overheard two neighbors discussing her.
“That child is quite the story-teller,” one woman said
“That child is the biggest liar on God’s green earth,” the other woman replied. “She wouldn’t know the truth if it fell out of the sky and clumped her on the head.”
Cathy knew then that she would be a writer.
She studied Creative Writing at Michigan State University under Professor Albert Drake. She has worked as a dude ranch hand, a university seminar coordinator, a paralegal, and an assistant in a fire investigation firm. The mother of three grown children, she lives in Chattanooga, Tennessee with her husband and a rescue dog named Yoshi. She is the author of Revenge of the Kudzu Debutantes, Secret Lives of the Kudzu Debutantes, Beach Trip, and Summer in the South, all published through Random House/Ballantine Books.
Her fifth novel, The Sisters Montclair, is about a twenty-one-year old runaway who takes a job as a caregiver for a ninety-four year old Southern grande dame, a woman fleeing her own mysterious past. Think Girl, Interrupted meets Driving Miss Daisy. With a twist. (From the publisher.)
Book Reviews
(Mainstream press reviews have not yet appeared online for Holton's newest book. Included are reviews from her previous novels.)
Revenge of the Kudzu Debutantes
Holton has a lively, fluid style that shifts easily among the viewpoints’ of several characters and goes down as easily as sweet tea.
Boston Globe
Three Southern Belles wreak havoc in the lives of their cheating husbands in this light, likable debut.
Kirkus Reviews
Secret Lives of the Kudzu Debutantes
Holton’s headstrong heroines deliver homespun wisdom and hearty laughs in this uproarious sequel.
Booklist
Sharp, witty, and warm.
Entertainment Weekly
Beach Trip
A brilliant, bubbly, bracing novel...packed with hilarity and heartache.
Wichita Falls Times Record News
A poignant tale of heartbreak and happiness that celebrates the resiliency of women.
Chattanooga Times Free Press
Summer in the South
Brimming with unforgettable characters, smart conversations, and an engaging mystery that makes spending a summer in the south a tantalizing proposition.
Kirkus Reviews
Part gothic mystery, part romance…sit back with a cold drink on a shady porch, and enjoy.
Roanoke Times
Discussion Questions
1. What was The Sisters Montclair about? What are some of the book’s themes?
2. How realistic were the characters of Stella and Alice? Did you like them? Hate them?
3. The relationship between Stella and Alice is central to the novel. Have you ever experienced a similar friendship with another woman, something perhaps unexpected because of your backgrounds and interests?
4. By falling in love with Brendan, Alice made a choice that had moral implications in the story. Would you have made the same decision? Why or why not?
5. When Professor Dillard asks Stella why she stays with Alice, Stella replies, “Because she’s wounded.” How does this statement relate to Stella’s abandonment by her own mother? How does it relate to the central themes of love, friendship, and support that develop between Stella and Alice?
6. How did the relationship between Alice and her sister, Laura, parallel Alice’s relationship with Stella?
7. Stella and Alice are products, not only of their class, but also of their generation. If Alice had been born into the freedoms afforded women of Stella’s generation, would her life have been different? In what ways? Are there clues in the novel about how Alice fantasized, as a young woman, about living her life?
8. Stella and Alice’s background are so completely different that each has difficulty clearly seeing the other. Alice’s elite upbringing makes her naive about Stella’s past, and Stella has a tendency to believe that money is a protection from tragedy. But does anyone ever truly have a perfect life? Have you ever known someone who seemed to “have it all,” only to discover later that they had suffered through some unimaginable tragedy?
9. The novel essentially takes place in two different time periods. How did the author handle this? Did you feel you were experiencing the time and place in which the book was set?
10. How was Laura’s tragic fate foreshadowed in the novel? Were you surprised by the ending, or expecting it?
11. Were you surprised at the end of the novel by Alice’s confession:
There’s all kinds of love. There’s the kind that comes over you like a sickness, and there’s the kind that comes on after years of shared struggle and companionship. And I can tell you, from my experience, it’s the second kind that lasts longest. The other eventually burns away like a fever. Leaving what—guilt, regret? Would I have been happier with Brendan Burke? I don’t think so. He wasn’t the man I thought he was. I got the life I needed with Bill Whittington, even if it didn’t seem like the one I wanted at the time.
12. Did your impression of Brendan Burke change over the course of the novel? Of Bill Whittington?
13. Did the story pull you in, or did you have to force yourself to finish it?
14. How did the book compare to other books by the author? Would you recommend this book to other readers?
(Questions issued by publisher.)