Coal River
Ellen Marie Wiseman, 2016
Kensington Books
304 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781617734472
Summary
This vibrant historical novel explores one young woman's determination to put an end to child labor in a Pennsylvania mining town.
As a child, Emma Malloy left isolated Coal River, Pennsylvania, vowing never to return. Now, orphaned and penniless at nineteen, she accepts a train ticket from her aunt and uncle and travels back to the rough-hewn community
Treated like a servant by her relatives, Emma works for free in the company store. There, miners and their impoverished families must pay inflated prices for food, clothing, and tools, while those who owe money are turned away to starve.
Most heartrending of all are the breaker boys Emma sees around the village—young children who toil all day sorting coal amid treacherous machinery. Their soot-stained faces remind Emma of the little brother she lost long ago, and she begins leaving stolen food on families' doorsteps, and marking the miners' bills as paid.
Though Emma's actions draw ire from the mine owner and police captain, they lead to an alliance with a charismatic miner who offers to help her expose the truth. And as the lines blur between what is legal and what is just, Emma must risk everything to follow her conscience.
An emotional, compelling novel that rings with authenticity—Coal River is a deft and honest portrait of resilience in the face of hardship, and of the simple acts of courage that can change everything. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—ca. 1961-62
• Where—Three Mile Bay, New York, USA
• Education—Lyme Central School
• Currently—lives on Lake Ontario in upstate New York
Ellen Marie Wiseman discovered her love of reading and writing while attending first grade in one of the last one-room schoolhouses in upper New York State.
Her debut novel The Plum Tree—a WWII story about a young German woman trying to save the love of her life, a Jewish man—was inspired by her mother's childhood in Germany during the Second World War. The book was published in 2013.
Wiseman's second novel, What She Left Behind, published in 2014, centers on the now-shuttered Willard Asylum for the Insane in Ovid, near Seneca Lake, New York, and involves a woman wrongly committed.
Coal River, Wiseman's 2016 novel, revolves around the efforts of a young woman to help at-risk workers in the Pennsylvania col mines.
The Life She Was Given, released in 2017, tells the story of two sisters: Lilly who is sold to the circus in 1931, and the other, years later, who inherits the family farm.
Originally from Three Mile Bay, New York, Wiseman lives on Lake Ontario with her husband. (Adapted from the publisher.)
Visit the author's website.
Book Reviews
Wiseman (What She Left Behind) offers heartbreaking and historically accurate depictions of the dangerous mines, the hopeless workers, and their improbable fight for justice. The richly developed coal town acts as a separate, complex character; readers will want to look away even as they're drawn into a powerful quest for purpose and redemption.
Publishers Weekly
[A] picture of the struggles mining families faced in the early 1900s. Emma is a strong, likable character...supported by a cast of equally unlikable characters who are easy to hate. Although the dialogue and narrative can be simplistic and overly explanatory, the plot of Coal River sweeps the reader along (Ages 15 to Adult). —Deanne Boyer; .
VOYA
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)
(We'll add specific questions if and when they're made available by the publisher.)
What the Waves Know
Tamara Valentine, 2016
HarperCollins
352 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780062413857
Summary
On the sharp crags of tiny Tillings Island lies the secret of Izabella Rae Haywood’s sixth birthday.
That night, her father vanished, taking her voice—and the truth of what really happened—along with him. In the autumn of 1974, after eight long years of unsuccessful psychiatrist visits and silence, Iz’s mother packs up the tattered remains of their life, determined to return to Tillings in one last attempt to reclaim Iz’s voice—and piece together the splintered memories of the day her words ran dry.
But when the residents of Tillings greet them with a standoffish welcome, it becomes clear that they know something about Iz, and the father she adored, that she does not.
Now, as the island’s annual Yemaya festival prepares to celebrate the ties that bind mothers to children, lovers to each other, and humankind to the sea, Iz must unravel the tangled threads of her own history...or risk losing herself—and any chance she may have for a future—to the past. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
For the past fourteen years, Tamara has held the position of Professor of English at Johnson & Wales University in Providence, Rhode Island, where she teaches an array of advanced writing, literature, and communication courses.
During her years of writing, she has contributed to Parent’s Paper Magazine, Stillwater, The Maze, Teacher as Writer, and publications for the New England Association of Teacher’s of English, as well as select biographies and articles for the former Goosewing Press.
Presently, Tamara lives in Kingston, Rhode Island with her husband and three children where they spend their free time as accomplished beach bums—not far from where she began as a child—still seeking hidden worlds. (From the author's website.)
Book Reviews
Valentine’s debut novel is a beautiful tale of loss, love and the fortitude of the human spirit.
Romantic Times BOOKclub
With the sass of Fannie Flagg and the subtle magic of Alice Hoffman, this short but powerful book should find readers of many generations.
Booklist
[W]ell-written, charming.... [Valentine] writes gracefully about loss and sadness and how time and good people can help to heal the wounds of a hurting child. The author also handles mental illness and the damage it can cause a family with tact and care. —Jennifer Mills, Shorewood-Troy Lib., IL
Library Journal
In a novel rich in mythology and childhood secrets, a girl searches for her voice in the Rhode Island town where she stopped speaking at age 6.... This dreamy coming-of-age mystery unfolds in tantalizing waves with keen insight and lush prose.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. What the Waves Know is told from the first-person point of view of Izabella, who hasn’t spoken in eight years. The concept of stories and secrets rests at the heart of this piece. How does Izabella become the keeper of both through her silence?
2. How does the title What the Waves Know represent these elements of the work?
3. In what ways do religion and mythology make sense of the world for Izabella? What myths, specifically, does she embrace? Are there similarities between them even though they are drawn from different cultures?
4. Do you think it is true that Izabella cannot speak initially, or is she choosing her own silence?
5. Izabella not only accompanies her father on his adventures, she follows him into the stories that slowly take over reality for him. Is there a point when she makes a conscious decision to stop? If so, when?
6. The characters all represent different interpretations of what defines mental illness, as well as dramatically different responses to trauma and loss. How do they each reframe their lives in the face of devastation? How does each hold on to the past and let go of it?
7. The title plays not only on the theme of mental illness, but a person’s culpability, or lack of it, in the face of mental illness. In what passages do we see this?
8. Throughout the story, Izabella both wants to hear the Nikommo and is afraid of them. Why? How do they speak to the issues with her father? Why might it be important that they are tied to her father’s heredity? Is this potentially defining to Izabella?
9. Izabella is afraid that she is insane. Why? What does this reveal about her actual breadth of understanding about what happened with her father?
10. One of the elements of the story is that the past and present continuously weave and bob around one another. Why has the author created a storyline in which you are constantly being pulled from one point in time to another?
11. Not only is the reader being torn between the past and present, she is also being thrust in and out of stories and mythologies. Why? Is there a clear truth behind the fiction?
12. While in many ways Zorrie’s character is struggling to get Izabella to fall into societal norms, Remy’s character is intent on ignoring societal rules and norms. How are the two characters different? What role does Remy play in healing both Izabella and Zorrie?
13. Why does Remy become so entwined in Zorrie and Izabella’s life? How do the different members of the O’Malley family respond to Zorrie and Izabella returning to Tillings Island? How do the vastly different reactions represent the human experience of loss and grief?
14. Both of Izabella’s parents impart aspects of their philosophies about life to her, and both visions of the world become equally important in her recovery. What does each parent give Izabella and how does it become integral to her survival?
15. Competing images of light and darkness are used symbolically throughout the story. What do they represent in the struggle for Izabella to reclaim and make sense of what has happened? One of the issues central to her struggle is weighing what is real against what is fiction, from religion to perception. How does she resolve this?
16. Izabella says she first came to know what it meant to be God standing in the waters of Potter’s Creek. What do you think she means by this and how does it become a critical framework for the story?
17. Although the impetus of the story revolves around Ansel Haywood’s disappearance, the author has included repeating images and references to the Divine Feminine in Yemaya, the moon, the Virgin Mary, and Venus. Why does this become inherently important to the story?18. In ancient times, the moon was the sign of the “Triple Goddess,” representing maiden, mother, and crone. How is this interpretation realized in the text?
19. The salmon in Potter’s Creek becomes an important symbol for Izabella’s story. How does it foreshadow what is to come in the story?
20. In many ways, each of the characters has a separate understanding and interpretation of the past. How does this speak to the idea of stories defining our realities?
21. Does Izabella become the healed or the healer in the story?
22. Why might the author have chosen a stone to represent the process of carrying secrets? How does this come to represent both the interconnectivity and independence of our own existence and reality?
(Questions issued by the publisher.)
The Unquiet Dead (Rachel Getty and Esa Khattak Novels, 1)
Ausma Zehanat Khan, 2014
St. Martin's Press
368 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781250055187
Summary
Despite their many differences, Detective Rachel Getty trusts her boss, Esa Khattak, implicitly.
But she's still uneasy at Khattak's tight-lipped secrecy when he asks her to look into Christopher Drayton's death. Drayton's apparently accidental fall from a cliff doesn't seem to warrant a police investigation, particularly not from Rachel and Khattak's team, which handles minority-sensitive cases.
But when she learns that Drayton may have been living under an assumed name, Rachel begins to understand why Khattak is tip-toeing around this case. It soon comes to light that Drayton may have been a war criminal with ties to the Srebrenica massacre of 1995.
If that's true, any number of people might have had reason to help Drayton to his death, and a murder investigation could have far-reaching ripples throughout the community. But as Rachel and Khattak dig deeper into the life and death of Christopher Drayton, every question seems to lead only to more questions, with no easy answers.
Had the specters of Srebrenica returned to haunt Drayton at the end, or had he been keeping secrets of an entirely different nature? Or, after all, did a man just fall to his death from the Bluffs?
In her spellbinding debut The Unquiet Dead, Ausma Zehanat Khan has written a complex and provocative story of loss, redemption, and the cost of justice that will linger with readers long after turning the final page. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—ca. 1970
• Where—UK
• Education—Toronto, Ontario, Canada
• Awards—B.A., University of Toronto; LL.B., LL. M, University of Ottawa
• Currently—lives Denver, Colorado, USA
Ausma Zehanat Khan is the author of the debut novel The Unquiet Dead published in 2014 to widespread critical acclaim, including a Publishers Weekly starred review, and reviews in the Los Angeles Times and New York Times. The Unquiet Dead was also a January 2015 Indie Next pick. Her acclaimed second novel, The Language of Secrets, was published in 2016. She is also at work on a fantasy series, to be published in 2017.
A frequent lecturer and commentator, Ms. Khan holds a Ph.D. in International Human Rights Law with a research specialization in military intervention and war crimes in the Balkans. Ms. Khan completed her LL.B. and LL.M. at the University of Ottawa, and her B.A. in English Literature & Sociology at the University of Toronto.
Formerly, she served as Editor in Chief of Muslim Girl magazine. The first magazine to address a target audience of young Muslim women, Muslim Girl re-shaped the conversation about Muslim women in North America. The magazine was the subject of two documentaries, and hundreds of national and international profiles and interviews, including CNN International, Current TV, and Al Jazeera "Everywoman".
Ms. Khan practiced immigration law in Toronto and has taught international human rights law at Northwestern University, as well as human rights and business law at York University. She is a long-time community activist and writer, and currently lives in Colorado with her husband. (From the author's website.)
Book Reviews
Ausma Zehanat Khan's gripping first novel tackles questions of identity, culture, revenge and war horrors in a strong police procedural…. Khan illustrates her powerful storytelling through her well-sculpted characters…. An intelligent plot and graceful writing make The Unquiet Dead an outstanding debut that is not easily forgotten.
New York Times
Impressive…. Throughout Getty and Khattak’s solid and comprehensive investigation, Khan’s talents are evident. This first in what may become a series is a many-faceted gem. It’s a sound police procedural, a somber study of loss and redemption and, most of all, a grim effort to make sure that crimes against humanity are not forgotten.
Washington Post
The Unquiet Dead blazes what one hopes will be a new path guided by the author's keen understanding of the intersection of faith and core Muslim values, complex human nature and evil done by seemingly ordinary people. It is these qualities that make this a debut to remember and one that even those who eschew the genre will devour in one breathtaking sitting.
Los Angeles Times
This is Canadian-born Khan’s first novel and what a debut it is!... Khan knows her subject, knows her hometown, and knows how to keep the suspense building. This is a writer to watch.
Globe and Mail (Toronto)
[B]eautiful and powerful.... Through her characters’ interactions and passages taken from testimony at war crimes trials, Khan reveals the depths of horror and venality that people are capable of while also portraying the healing of long-sundered relationships.
Publishers Weekly
(Starred review.) Compelling and hauntingly powerful…anyone looking for an intensely memorable mystery should put this book at the top of their list.
Library Journal
The scandal of U.N. forces standing by while thousands of Muslim men, women and children were slaughtered is intensified by the possibility that Krstic entered Canada with a fortune in blood money. Khan’s stunning debut is a poignant, elegantly written mystery laced with complex characters who force readers to join them in dealing with ugly truths.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. The original title of this book was "An Unsafe Area." Now that you have finished The Unquiet Dead, consider why "An Unsafe Area" might have been an appropriate title. What themes, events or settings in the book does it speak to? Do you prefer this title to The Unquiet Dead? Why or why not?
2. By the end of the mystery, we learn that Inspector Khattak is certain that Christopher Drayton was pushed to his death by Imam Muharrem. However, no independent corroboration of Khattak’s conclusion is offered, as Muharrem never makes a direct confession. If Inspector Khattak is correct, should he have arrested Imam Muharrem? Has justice been served? What does the ending of the book tell us about our notions of what real justice is?
3. How do you interpret Mink Norman’s statement to Khattak: "In Bosnia, identity is a curse. So do not pretend to know us." Why is Khattak so personally invested in the investigation? In what ways do his personal feelings cloud his judgment, and/or help illuminate some of the facts that lead to the mystery’s resolution?
4. The relationship between the two detectives, Esa Khattak and Rachel Getty, is sometimes an uneasy one. Although Khattak treats Rachel with respect, Rachel behaves as though she has something to prove to him. What factors influence Rachel’s sense of inadequacy? What impact has Rachel’s relationship with her father, retired police superintendent Don Getty,had on her career as a police officer? In what ways do Esa Khattak and Don Getty differ as superior officers?
5. Mothers play an important role in The Unquiet Dead. We see strikingly different manifestations of motherhood in the characters of Melanie Blessant and Lillian Getty. Tangentially, we also hear about the mothers of Aldo and Harry Osmond, Nathan and Audrey Clare, and David Newhall. How might our traditional expectations of motherhood be subverted by the relationship between Melanie Blessant and her daughters, Hadley and Cassidy? Or by Lillian Getty’s relationship with her children, Rachel and Zachary? How might the deceased mothers of David Newhall and the Clares be more idealized by contrast?
6. One of the themes of The Unquiet Dead is loyalty versus betrayal, a theme that is both personal and political. In what sense might the Bosnian characters in the story believe that they have been betrayed? Is this betrayal personal or political? Does it apply to Mink Norman’s relationship with Esa Khattak? If so, which of these two characters might claim to have been betrayed by the other, and why? What other examples of loyalty or betrayal in The Unquiet Dead can you think of?
7. The Bosnian lily, or Lilium bosniacum, is a plant native to the country of Bosnia. The fleur-de-lis symbol used on the coat of arms of the kings of Bosnia until 1463 may have been a representation of the Bosnian lily. It was revived on the Bosnian flag of independence in 1992, then removed in later iterations of the flag. Discuss the significance of the Bosnian lily as a personal and a political symbol in The Unquiet Dead. Why does it matter that this lily was planted in Christopher Drayton’s garden? What impact does the discovery of the lily have on Christopher Drayton?
8. In The Unquiet Dead, the librarian Mink Norman alludes to the history of Moorish Spain or Andalusia. She sees this period of history as a "golden idyll," and later compares Andalusia to the country of Bosnia before the 1992 war. Is this a valid comparison? In his frequent visits to the Andalusia Museum, is Inspector Khattak drawn more to the history of Andalusia or to the librarian herself? What does Ringsong represent to Esa Khattak, and why might he identify so strongly with the museum?
9. Toward the end of the book, Rachel begins to focus on a series of clues: the music, the photograph, the lilies, the gun. What role does each of these clues play in the mystery? How does the association of these particular clues help Rachel understand what happened on the night that Christopher Drayton fell to his death?
(Questions issued by the publisher.)
The Language of Secrets (Rachel Getty and Esa Khattak Novels, 2)
Ausma Zehanat Khan, 2016
St. Martin's Press
336 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781250055125
Summary
Detective Esa Khattak heads up Canada's Community Policing Section, which handles minority-sensitive cases across all levels of law enforcement.
Khattak is still under scrutiny for his last case, so he's surprised when INSET, Canada's national security team, calls him in on another politically sensitive issue.
For months, INSET has been investigating a local terrorist cell which is planning an attack on New Year's Day. INSET had an informant, Mohsin Dar, undercover inside the cell. But now, just weeks before the attack, Mohsin has been murdered at the group's training camp deep in the woods.
INSET wants Khattak to give the appearance of investigating Mohsin's death, and then to bury the lead. They can't risk exposing their operation, or Mohsin's role in it. But Khattak used to know Mohsin, and he knows he can't just let this murder slide.
So Khattak sends his partner, Detective Rachel Getty, undercover into the unsuspecting mosque which houses the terrorist cell. As Rachel tentatively reaches out into the unfamiliar world of Islam, and begins developing relationships with the people of the mosque and the terrorist cell within it, the potential reasons for Mohsin's murder only seem to multiply, from the political and ideological to the intensely personal.
The Unquiet Dead author Ausma Zehanat Khan once again dazzles in The Language of Secrets, a brilliant mystery woven into a profound and intimate story of humanity. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—ca. 1970
• Where—UK
• Raised—Toronto, Ontario, Canada
• Education—B.A., University of Toronto; LL.B., LL. M., University of Ottawa
• Currently—lives Denver, Colorado, USA
Ausma Zehanat Khan is the author of the debut novel The Unquiet Dead published in 2014 to widespread critical acclaim, including a Publishers Weekly starred review, and reviews in the Los Angeles Times and New York Times. The Unquiet Dead was also a January 2015 Indie Next pick. Her acclaimed second novel, The Language of Secrets, was published in 2016. She is also at work on a fantasy series, to be published in 2017.
A frequent lecturer and commentator, Ms. Khan holds a Ph.D. in International Human Rights Law with a research specialization in military intervention and war crimes in the Balkans. Ms. Khan completed her LL.B. and LL.M. at the University of Ottawa, and her B.A. in English Literature & Sociology at the University of Toronto.
Formerly, she served as Editor in Chief of Muslim Girl magazine. The first magazine to address a target audience of young Muslim women, Muslim Girl re-shaped the conversation about Muslim women in North America. The magazine was the subject of two documentaries, and hundreds of national and international profiles and interviews, including CNN International, Current TV, and Al Jazeera "Everywoman".
Ms. Khan practiced immigration law in Toronto and has taught international human rights law at Northwestern University, as well as human rights and business law at York University. She is a long-time community activist and writer, and currently lives in Colorado with her husband. (From the author's website.)
Book Reviews
Khan delivers an action-packed police procedural complemented by strong characters with believable motives.
Associated Press
Those prepared to slog through the blizzard of poetry used to convey clues will be rewarded by a gripping climax in the snowy wilderness of Ontario’s Algonquin Park.
Publishers Weekly
(Starred review.) Part of the search hinges on Khattak's knowledge of Arabic poetry, but this isn't a puzzle mystery; rather it is a novel of character and mores, and an exceptionally fine one. Verdict: A heartfelt novel for lovers of crime fiction and anyone interested in the complexities of living as a Muslim in the West today. —David Keymer, Modesto, CA
Library Journal
The cell members are afforded fully dimensional personalities and varied passions, ideals, and justifications for their actions; everyone has their reasons, Khan understands, and her nuanced exploration of those reasons elevates her second novel.... A smart, measured, immersive dive into a poorly understood, terrifyingly relevant subculture of violent extremism.
Kirkus Reviews
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)
(We'll add specific questions if and when they're made available by the publisher. In the meantime, use our generic mystery questions.)
GENERIC DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
Mystery / Crime / Suspense Thrillers
1. Talk about the characters, both good and bad. Describe their personalities and motivations. Are they fully developed and emotionally complex? Or are they flat, one-dimensional heroes and villains?
2. What do you know...and when do you know it? At what point in the book do you begin to piece together what happened?
3. Good crime writers embed hidden clues in plain sight, slipping them in casually, almost in passing. Did you pick them out, or were you...clueless? Once you've finished the book, go back to locate the clues hidden in plain sight. How skillful was the author in burying them?
4. Good crime writers also tease us with red-herrings—false clues—to purposely lead readers astray? Does your author try to throw you off track? If so, were you tripped up?
5. Talk about the twists & turns—those surprising plot developments that throw everything you think you've figured out into disarray.
- Do they enhance the story, add complexity, and build suspense?
- Are they plausible or implausible?
- Do they feel forced and gratuitous—inserted merely to extend the story?
6. Does the author ratchet up the suspense? Did you find yourself anxious—quickly turning pages to learn what happened? A what point does the suspense start to build? Where does it climax...then perhaps start rising again?
7. A good ending is essential in any mystery or crime thriller: it should ease up on tension, answer questions, and tidy up loose ends. Does the ending accomplish those goals?
- Is the conclusion probable or believable?
- Is it organic, growing out of clues previously laid out by the author (see Question 3)?
- Or does the ending come out of the blue, feeling forced or tacked-on?
- Perhaps it's too predictable.
- Can you envision a different or better ending?
8. Are there certain passages in the book—ideas, descriptions, or dialogue—that you found interesting or revealing...or that somehow struck you? What lines, if any, made you stop and think?
9. Overall, does the book satisfy? Does it live up to the standards of a good crime story or suspense thriller? Why or why not?
(Generic Mystery Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)
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The Big Rewind
Libby Cudmore, 2016
HarperCollins
256 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780062403537
Summary
Listening to someone else’s mix tapes is a huge breach of trust.
But KitKat was dead...and curiosity got the better of me.
When a mix tape destined for her friend KitKat accidentally arrives in Jett Bennett’s mailbox, Jett doesn’t think twice about it—even in the age of iTunes and Spotify, the hipster residents of the Barter Street district of Brooklyn are in a constant competition to see who can be the most retro.
But when Jett finds KitKat dead on her own kitchen floor, she suspects the tape might be more than just a quirky collection of lovelorn ballads.
And when KitKat’s boyfriend, Bronco, is arrested for her murder, Jett and her best friend, Sid, set out on an epic urban quest through strip joints and record stores, vegan bakeries and basement nightclubs, to discover who the real killer is.
However, the further Jett digs into KitKat’s past, the more she discovers about her own left-behind love life—and the mysterious man whose song she still clings to. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
Libby Cudmore worked at video stores, bookstores, and temp agencies before settling down in Oneonta, New York, to write. Her short stories have appeared in PANK, Stoneslide Corrective, Big Click, and Big Lucks. The Big Rewind is her first novel. She is a reporter for The Freeman's Journal and Hometown Oneonta newspapers. (From the publisher.)
Book Reviews
Heads up, vinyl-loving hipsters: Cudmore's debut is for you. Jett Bennett is a young New York City temp who came to the big city with dreams of becoming a music journalist.... [M]usic is the glue that holds the story together.... Cudmore has preserved for all time a slice of current, hipster Brooklyn.
Publishers Weekly
[A] murder mystery, romance, coming-of-age story, and exercise in 1980s and 1990s music appreciation.... However, the author packs many characters and subplots into less than 300 pages, which might set some readers spinning, just like a record. [F]ast-paced, hip, and seminostalgic. —Samantha Gust, Niagara Univ. Lib., NY
Library Journal
Cudmore’s funny, breezy first novel...deftly melds mystery, romance, and music. Jett makes for a very refreshing lead in a novel that will appeal to twentysomethings as well as those enamored with Warren Zevon and the Vapors.
Booklist
(Starred review). [This] might be a new mystery subgenre—the hipster cozy.... Stories of the murdered KitKat...add depth and soul to the story. By the end, readers will...mourn her passing. A mystery that will inspire more than one playlist and, hopefully, a sequel.
Kirkus Reviews
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)
(We'll add specific questions if and when they're made available by the publisher. In the meantime, use our generic mystery questions.)
GENERIC DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
Mystery / Crime / Suspense Thrillers
1. Talk about the characters, both good and bad. Describe their personalities and motivations. Are they fully developed and emotionally complex? Or are they flat, one-dimensional heroes and villains?
2. What do you know...and when do you know it? At what point in the book do you begin to piece together what happened?
3. Good crime writers embed hidden clues in plain sight, slipping them in casually, almost in passing. Did you pick them out, or were you...clueless? Once you've finished the book, go back to locate the clues hidden in plain sight. How skillful was the author in burying them?
4. Good crime writers also tease us with red-herrings—false clues—to purposely lead readers astray? Does your author try to throw you off track? If so, were you tripped up?
5. Talk about the twists & turns—those surprising plot developments that throw everything you think you've figured out into disarray.
- Do they enhance the story, add complexity, and build suspense?
- Are they plausible or implausible?
- Do they feel forced and gratuitous—inserted merely to extend the story?
6. Does the author ratchet up the suspense? Did you find yourself anxious—quickly turning pages to learn what happened? A what point does the suspense start to build? Where does it climax...then perhaps start rising again?
7. A good ending is essential in any mystery or crime thriller: it should ease up on tension, answer questions, and tidy up loose ends. Does the ending accomplish those goals?
- Does it grow out of clues previously laid out by the author (see Question 3).
- Or does the ending come out of the blue?
- Does it feel forced...tacked-on...or a cop-out?
- Or perhaps it's too predictable.
- Can you envision a better, or different, ending?
8. Are there certain passages in the book—ideas, descriptions, or dialogue—that you found interesting or revealing...or that somehow struck you? What lines, if any, made you stop and think?
9. Overall, does the book satisfy? Does it live up to the standards of a good crime story or suspense thriller? Why or why not?
(Generic Mystery Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)
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