Montpelier Tomorrow
MaryLee MacDonald, 2014
All Things That Matter Press
307 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780990715818
Summary
After the deaths of her parents, Colleen Gallagher, a kindergarten teacher with three grown kids, is finally free to help out during the birth of her daughter’s second child. She’s at her daughter’s house when her son-in-law returns from the doctor with news that he has Lou Gehrig’s disease. Colleen, widowed when her own children were young, fears that fate is about to strike another blow at her family.
The sick man’s hapless father and ditzy, shopaholic mother provide comic relief by spoiling the grandchildren. Believing there’s no real hope, they urge him to go on a respirator, the only way to permanently "save his life." When the sick man gathers his family for a surprise announcement, Colleen is stunned to learn that he wants to give the respirator a try.
He leaves it to his wife to make the final decision. Colleen’s daughter thinks she has months before her husband can’t breathe on his own, but the sick man is worse off than anyone realizes. When he tries to lure his wife into a Jacuzzi for a romantic evening, the combined effects of hot water and a full stomach stop his breathing. Only then does Colleen’s daughter decide she can’t endorse the respirator plan.
Her husband holds the respirator decision against her and begins to play the dying-man card, thus beginning a series of "lasts." To fulfill his wish to go somewhere snowy for his last Christmas, Colleen arranges a trip to Vermont, where she anticipates a reunion with a handsome young carpenter, her almost-lover and long-time friend. Colleen secretly has the hots for him, but in Vermont, it’s Colleen’s daughter who attracts his attention. A relationship develops between them, and Colleen’s daughter leans on this new man for support.
The powerful cocktail of love, duty, obligation, exhaustion, and frustration make it hard for Colleen to remember why she’d ever left her life in Illinois. The grandkids keep her awake. The dying man isn’t noble. Her daughter resents her presence. She’s going broke, but feels compelled to stay. After a blow-up between the two women, an uneasy truce is soon broken. Colleen admits defeat and announces her intention to leave. She can’t save her daughter or her daughter’s marriage. She must save herself.
While Colleen's daughter and family depart for Disney World, a getaway paid for by the sick man’s parents, Colleen is left to finish her daughter’s "to do" list. A phone call summons Colleen to the hospital, but it is not the "dying man" who’s in danger.
Author Bio
• Birth—September 26, 1945
• Raised—Redwood City, California, USA
• Education—B.A., Stanford University; M.A., San Francisco State University
• Currently—lives in Tempe, Arizona
In her words:
You’ve taken the "Ice Bucket Challenge." Now read about a family trying to deal with the seismic shock of an ALS diagnosis. This book is brand new.
As readers will surely guess, this novel had its beginnings in my own experience. I had just returned to writing when my son-in-law was diagnosed with ALS. I found myself immersed in an almost daily battle against Fate. How to relieve the stress on my daughter so that she could be a good mother to her kids? How to care for a man who became increasingly hard to deal with? How to get enough sleep, for heaven’s sakes. The one tiny sword I had to fight this battle was my writing. I used it to center myself. I hoped that making art would allow me to gain control over a tragedy unfolding before my eyes.
What you should know about me is that I’m not a beginning writer, nor a young one. I’ve racked up many prizes in literary magazines, including the Barry Hannah Prize, the ALR Fiction Prize, the Matt Clark Prize, the Ron Rash Award, and most recently, the Jeanne Leiby Award. A collection of my short stories will be published in 2015. I would love to participate with any book group that wants to read this novel and discuss it. (From the author.)
Visit the author's webpage...and her blog.
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Book Reviews
An engaging and heartfelt novel about the intricate relationships among family dealing with disease and disability. Characters are vivid, relatable, and all too imperfectly human. An emotional read.
Jewell Parker Rhodes, author of Douglass’ Women and Ninth Ward
Each time I have reread this fine novel, I have felt rewarded by the connection it offers to the central character, Colleen. She is that kind of character for which the large scale of the novel is made: her external and internal dilemmas have many dimensions; her relationships with other characters are shaped by complex past and present plot tensions; her viewpoint is transformative, that is, it presents the world as she alone perceives it. I can think of no single page in which her voice is not an irreplaceable gift to the reader.
Kevin McIlvoy, author of The Fifth Station, Little Peg, and Hyssop
In her novel Montpelier Tomorrow, Marylee MacDonald illuminates a seemingly dark, hopeless story with light, humor, and compassion. In the aftermath of her son-in-law's devastating diagnosis, Colleen Gallagher becomes increasingly driven to save her daughter and grandchildren even as she struggles to forge a life of her own. Montpelier Tomorrow is at once an engrossing account of the impossible choices faced by caregivers in the United States and a moving portrait of one close-knit, memorable family.
Katherine Shonk, author of The Red Passport and Happy Now?
Discussion Questions
1. In most novels there’s a clear heroine or hero working to defeat an enemy. In Montpelier Tomorrow do you think that Sandy is the villain or that Tony is? Sandy and Colleen have quite a lot of conflict, and that conflict escalates as the novel progresses. Do you think Sandy considers her mom an antagonist or an ally? How about Tony: Who are his allies? Who helps him in his dark night of the soul?
2. What do you think about an unseen villain being the antagonist, namely ALS itself? Given Colleen’s background, could Fate be considered the antagonist?
3. Do you think some families or individuals have a disproportionate share of bad things happen to them? What did you think about Sandy’s remark about feeling like bad luck magnet?
4. Imagine that each of the main characters is carrying baggage from the past. What is in Sandy’s suitcase? What baggage is Lillian carrying? Does Tony have baggage, or is ALS burden enough?
5. What did you think the chapters in Chicago reveal about Colleen’s character? When you were reading the novel were you glad for a break about then?
6. Did you like Esmeralda? Did Colleen have an easier time being with her than being with Sandy?
7. What were Colleen’s unmet needs? These might be physical or psychological. By the end of the book what was her greatest unmet need?
8. Do you think it’s easy for mothers and daughters to know each other on a deep level, or are there traps or patterns that families revert to when they’re together?
9. Guilt is a big player in the novel. Can you talk a little about Sandy’s guilt in not being able to spend more time with her children? What about Colleen’s guilt that she didn’t invite Esmeralda to live with her?
10. The climactic event of the novel is precipitated by Sandy’s decision to come back on the train from Disney World. In what way has the book prepared you to believe that her decision was almost inevitable? Could she have left Tony with his parents and not been plagued by guilt?
11. Were there places where you understood that the children were being hurt by Tony’s illness? Can you think of scenes where Josh revealed his worries?
12. In a sense readers are the bystanders to this drama, much like the friends from Tony’s and Sandy’s neighborhood and like Colleen’s teacher-friends. How much do you think Sandy’s and Tony’s neighbors really understood what was going on inside that house? If you’d received an email with the "to do" list, would you have signed up for the early morning shift or found reasons not to?
13. At the end of the book, Colleen and Charles discuss the idea of heroism: who is and who is not behaving heroically. How do you think Colleen feels about herself at the end of the book?
(Questions courtesy of the author.)
The Freedom of a Tangled Vine
Heather Tierney, 2014
Wise Ink Press
272 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781940014104
Summary
Two women. Two generations. Two different concepts of truth.
Photographs of a stranger are found in her mother’s jewelry box. A small town whispers about the baby with auburn hair.
With her daughter’s uncovering of a long-held family secret, Alina is forced to reopen the wounds she had hidden for more than forty years. Now, with her family as the audience, Alina must give breath to fragments of her life she had drowned, and unravel what she had twisted into truth.
The Freedom of a Tangled Vine is the story of one family’s discovery of what lies between memory and reality. And of the intricate ties that define and embrace us.
Told through both Alina’s and her daughter’s perspectives and covering different time-frames, the stories unweave the past—and braid together the present. In doing so, both women discover that it is not what is said, but rather what is felt, that creates the meaning and beauty of family. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
Heather Tierney was raised in Wisconsin, lives in Minnesota, and considers both places home. She received her Masters degree in English at St. Cloud State University. (From the author.)
Visit the author's website.
Book Reviews
A beautiful and emotional novel about the bonds that define who we are. With words that matter and images with purpose, this nostalgic read is a brilliantly crafted story of the strength of family and the unwavering love of a mother.
Marilyn Jax, international award-winning author of Sapphire Trails, Road to Omalos, and The Find.
This book was a phenomenal read. The story is interesting and it is sweet and the author has a way of making you love all the characters and understand them. Can't wait for Heather Tierney to write another book!
Josie K. - Goodreads review
This story has beautiful prose, realistic dialogue, and characters that feel like they live next door - powerful writing. It is an emotional and realistic family drama, and I read it in two days. I love this story, and I recommended it to other readers who loved it too.
Jay - Goodreads review
5 out of 5 star ratings on all reviews at www.goodreads.com
Discussion Questions
1. The story is told not only through plot, but also through images. Discuss which of the following images stood out to you, and what they seem to represent: vines, Alina’s garden, Fawn’s garden, the neighbor Margaret’s lawn, Alina’s auburn hair, trees, the Milwaukee harbor. Are there other images that stood out to you? What objects in your life hold great meaning or are symbolic to you?
2. One theme of the story is our sense of place and home. There are certain places that hold great meaning and evoke strong emotions in us. Where is a place that does this for you, and what does it make you feel or remember? How has this place changed over time, and how do those changes impact your feelings toward it?
3. One of the greatest discoveries in the book is the moment when Fawn considers whether she can hold onto her beautiful memories of childhood while also accepting the new truths about her family. What are the new truths? What does she conclude? What knowledge or event in your life has made you need to “rewrite” or rethink your past? How did you do this?
4. Fawn readily questions Alina about Aileen, but never directly questions Joe. What holds her back? Why do we approach some family members more openly, and sweep certain issues under the rug with others? Is Fawn sweeping the issue under the rug with her father, or is it still addressed indirectly?
5. There is a moment when Fawn realizes she will never remember her father as youthful and healthy, the way she used to think of him. Is this a positive or negative moment for her? What memories have you let fade, and has it been healthy or unhealthy to do so?
6. Before Alina actually mails the letter to initiate the meeting with Aileen, she confesses to Fawn that she is afraid of whether or not she’ll live up to the fantasy Aileen has created. Fawn assures her mother that she will, yet Fawn herself has created a fantasy of who her mother is. How has Fawn done this, and how do the flashbacks in the story help the reader understand the fantasy? How does Fawn’s fantasy of her mother differ from what Aileen’s might be?
7. Fawn’s relationships with her brothers differ, as the reader senses she is more connected with Jon. What makes Fawn protective of Jon, and how does her adult relationship with him echo her youthful one? In what ways do we, even as adults, fall into place with the old patterns of our sibling relationships?
8. Fawn’s friendship with Luisa opens up the sub-plot of Matthew and his girlfriend. How does this sub-plot reiterate the themes of the novel?
9. Consider how peripheral characters impact the story and add additional dimension to the reader’s understanding of the story. Consider Uncle Arthur, Jon and Pete, and Lea’s parents.
(Questions courtesy of the author.)
In Doubt
Drusilla Campbell, 2014
Grand Central
384 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781455510337
Summary
Defense Attorney Sophie Giraudo is about to open a new legal practice in her hometown of San Sebastian, California, when the beloved governer is shot and seriously wounded during a celebration in the town park.
The only thing more shocking than the crime itself is the identity of the would-be assassin: a seemingly gentle teenager named Donny. Driven by her desire to understand what could make a person with no history of violence suddenly commit such a terrible act, Sophie reluctantly agrees to take him on as a client, knowing that, at least, it will bring her some income.
But soon she realizes that she also has personal motivations for taking the case: a desire to prove to her overbearing mother that she is not the reckless and self-destructive tennager she used to be, to prove to her ex-husband, who happens to be the prosecuting attorney, that she can win her case, and to prove to herself that the traumatic events of her adolescence no longer define her.
As she digs deeper into Donny's past, Sophie begins to suspect that he might not be the cold-blooded killer everyone thinks he is. Does Donny's narcissistic mother really have her son's best interest in mind? Is Donny's mentor who runs Boys Into Men, a program for disadvantaged youths, the altruistic man he claims to be? Is Donny a deranged murderer, or a victim of his circumstances acting out of desperation?
As Sophie races to uncover the truth, she is forced to come to terms with her past and to fight for what she knows is right...even if it means risking her reputation and possibly her life. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—N/A
• Where—Melbourne, Australia
• Raised—Santa Clara Valley, California, USA
• Education—B.A., San Jose State University; M.A., American University
• Currently—lives in San Diego, California
In her words:
I wrote my first novel when I was in the sixth grade; and I’m confessing now, publicly, that I stole school paper to do it. What a thrill when I got to page one hundred.... For years I wrote nothing but first chapters, longhand, often sitting up in bed after a long day teaching school in London, Geelong and Changuinola, Panama. I traveled poor in my twenties, hitchhiking, often without money....
I never actually finished a story until the first year my husband and I lived in Washington, DC. By then I’d given up teaching and gotten an MA in Broadcast Journalism from American University. My science fiction story, "Piper, What Song" was bought and published and so was a second, "A Dream of Trumpeters." Awash in visions of runaway success, I gave up my day job—I was receptionist, secretary and an on-air personality at WAMU-FM, the District’s big NPR affiliate—and began writing fulltime....
When you read my books, I hope you find something of yourself in the women I write about. I hope their struggles and victories inspire and move you. Someone asked me why I write and though the full answer is too long to write here, it comes down to this: I write because I have always written; and if I stopped an essential part of me would stop too. I write because all my life I have loved stories, loved figuring out what makes people do the wild and weird things they do. I write because I want to connect with you, establish a bond between us based on common experiences and shared reflections. (Excerpted from the author's website.)
Visit author's website.
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Book Reviews
John Grisham meets Jodi Picoult.
Booklist
Campbell draws the reader into an ugly world in her excellent take on the many lines between right and wrong.
RT Book Reviews
As In Doubt winds around a tortuous road of compelling human drama, Campbell pulls the plug and creates a novel both unique and compelling in and of itself.
The Review Broads
In Doubt is undoubtedly a thought provoking novel that will make you question the meaning of justice.
Chick Lit Plus
Discussion Questions
1. Sophie and her mother have an adversarial relationship that is still based on a deep affection. What role do these women live in each other’s lives. In what way, if any, are they necessary to each other?
2. Recently a reader told me she was sick of reading about mothers and daughter relationships. Do you feel the same way? If you do, can you explain your feelings. What do books get right when dealing with mothers and daughters? Where do they go wrong?
3. Near the end of the book Roman expresses something like remorse. He says, "I want it to be different." What is the "if" he’s talking about? Is a pedophile capable of true remorse? Did you at any point find sympathy with Roman. If not, why?
4. Some readers have told me that Iva is just as guilty as Roman. How do you feel about this idea? In cases like this one, wives, mothers and girlfriends have frequently been cooperative. Sometimes by lying, sometimes by maintaining silence. Some claim not to have seen or been aware of anything. Is this possible? How do you explain it?
5. Is Iva’s love a "true love?" What is it that ties her to Roman? What drew them together in the first place?
6. What is the theory behind "restorative justice?" Is such widespread forgiveness even possible? It appears to have worked in South Africa. Why would that be so? What is required to make this psychologically challenging theory workable?
7. Why did Donny shoot the Governor? What role did Elena play in the crime, if any?
(Questions courtesy of the author.)
Brewster
Mark Slouka, 2013
W.W. Norton
288 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780393348835
Summary
A powerful story about an unforgettable friendship between two teenage boys and their hopes for escape from a dead-end town.
The year is 1968. The world is changing, and sixteen-year-old Jon Mosher is determined to change with it. Racked by guilt over his older brother’s childhood death and stuck in the dead-end town of Brewster, New York, he turns his rage into victories running track. Meanwhile, Ray Cappicciano, a rebel as gifted with his fists as Jon is with his feet, is trying to take care of his baby brother while staying out of the way of his abusive, ex-cop father.
When Jon and Ray form a tight friendship, they find in each other everything they lack at home, but it’s not until Ray falls in love with beautiful, headstrong Karen Dorsey that the three friends begin to dream of breaking away from Brewster for good. Freedom, however, has its price. As forces beyond their control begin to bear down on them, Jon sets off on the race of his life—a race to redeem his past and save them all.
Mark Slouka's work has been called "relentlessly observant, miraculously expressive" (New York Times Book Review). Reverberating with compassion, heartache, and grace, Brewster is an unforgettable coming-of-age story from one of our most compelling novelists. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—ca. 1958
• Where—Queens, New York, New York USA
• Raised—Brewster, New York
• Education—Columbia University
• Awards—PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award (Essay)
• Currently—lives in Brewster, New York
Mark Slouka is an American novelist and critic. The son of Czech immigrants, he is Associate Professor of Creative Writing at Columbia University and was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 2005. He is a frequent contributor to Harper's Magazine, where he is also a contributing editor.
The subject matter of his 1996 book War of the Worlds: Cyberspace and the Assault on Reality encompasses the extent to which virtual reality and blurring of real life with corporate fantasy has become a "genuine cultural phenomenon."
In 2003, his first novel God's Fool fictionalised the life of Siamese twins, Chang and Eng. and his 2006 short story "Dominion", originally published in TriQuarterly, was included within the anthology Best American Short Stories 2006. His short story "The Hare's Mask," originally published in Harper's, was included in the anthology The Best American Short Stories 2011.
In his 1020 book Essays from the Nick of Time, Slouka argues that "The humanities are a superb delivery mechanism for what we might call democratic values." In one of the essays, "Quitting the Paint Factory," he writes, "Idleness is ... requisite to the construction of a complete human being;... allowing us time to figure out who we are, and what we believe; by allowing us time to consider what is unjust, and what we might do about it." The essay collection won the 2011 PEN/Diamonstein-Spielvogel Award for the Art of the Essay.
His second novel, The Visible World, tells the story of a son uncovering his flawed parents earlier life in the Czech resistance. It gained notability in the UK following its inclusion in the 2008 Richard & Judy Book Club list.
In his third novel Brewster, published in 2013, two teenaged boys hope to escape their dead-end town, Brewster. Slouka's prose was referred to in the New York Times as "devastatingly agile." The Washington Post called the book "a masterpiece of winter sorrow." (Adapted from Wikipedia. Retrieved 9/21/2013.)
Book Reviews
[A] powerfully nostalgic novel steeped in innocence and idleness…Slouka's storytelling is sure and patient, deceptively steady and devastatingly agile. Like Ray, the profoundly lovable hero, Brewster is full of secrets, and they are tragic ones: there is no sadder fate than being hated by someone who should love you. Yet the story manages to transcend its hopeless circumstances. All the tender feelings these kids' parents should feel for them are transferred to us. We love them. They are our children, and in loving them, they are saved, and so are we.
Eleanor Henderson - New York Times
A masterpiece of winter sorrow… Slouka’s real triumph here is capturing the amber of grief, the way love and time have crystallized these memories into something just as gorgeous as it is devastating.
Ron Charles - Washington Post
Terrific…. [W]here Slouka distinguishes himself as an author of particular sensitivity and significance is in how accurately and memorably he is able to conjure up a particular mood that has no doubt been felt in every era, not just the late '60s and early '70s. There is a timeless sense of yearning here.
Adam Langer - Boston Globe
Evocative… gorgeously written… both spare and highly dramatic. Slouka has an exceptional ear for the way kids talk, an eye for the detail of a not-so-recent past …. In Brewster, Slouka creates a messy miniature. It's a tight, little world where …the subjects—human frailty, friendship, yearning, heart and love—don't make for easy poses. And you can't take your eyes from it.
John Barron - Chicago Tribune
[A] novel of stark and brutal truths…[Brewster] culminates in a scene of such visceral power and narrative force that this reader was left breathless. But perhaps Slouka's greatest accomplishment is his ability to blend his own authorial voice with the dialogue of his characters. It's as if the conversations that pass between Jon and Ray and Karen - about music, their plans for the future, their love and devotion to each other—are the lyrics to Slouka's melody. And what a beautiful and redemptive song it is.
Peter Geye - Minneapolis Star Tribune
(Starred review.) A simmering rage coupled with world-weary angst grip the four teenagers growing up as friends in Slouka’s hardscrabble novel.... Jon Mosher—once a scholarship-winning high school track star, now a wistful, glum adult—narrates the group’s tragic experiences during the winter of 1968.... [A] masterful coming-of-age novel.
Publishers Weekly
The setup is familiar: bright Jewish track star Jon is befriended by long-coat, wrong-side-of-the-tracks loner Ray as they both fall for smart, empathetic beauty Karen, but she loves only one of them (guess which?). What separates Slouka's coming-of-age story from most others are dead-on characters, the small-town setting in downstate New York, and the 1968–71 time frame.... The consequences for each character are both surprising and inevitable. —Robert E. Brown, Oswego, NY
Library Journal
(Starred review.) [P]oignant coming-of-age story.... What Slouka captures so well here is the burning desire of the four teens to leave their hardscrabble town behind and the restricted circumstances that seem to make tragedy an inevitable outcome.... Slouka gives them a voice here, one filled with equal parts humor and pain. —Joanne Wilkinson
Booklist
The book moves at a rapid and accelerating pace, and with ruthless precision, toward a surprising conclusion. But it takes shortcuts, indulging in a kind of sepia hokeyness at times and at others in a darkness that is too schematic and easy, that relies on a villainy that's not quite believable. Flawed, but unmistakably the work of an accomplished writer.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. The novel is named for the town it is set in, and it has a tremendously vivid sense of place. Describe the town of Brewster. In what ways is the setting important to this novel?
2. The author portrays a close friendship between two teenage boys in Brewster, a relationship less often portrayed than one between girls. Did you think that Jon and Ray’s friendship was an unlikely one? What made the two boys close? Did their relationship seem the same as ones you know between teen girls?
3. The narrator of Brewster is an adult Jon Mosher telling the story of his past. Why do you think the author made this choice? How would the novel be different if it were narrated by sixteen-year-old Jon Mosher in the present?
4.Jon’s affair with Tina feels like a hiatus, a brief escape from his real life and troubles, and she never reappears in the story. What might Jon have learned from his relationship with Tina that he brings to the rest of his experiences in the novel?
5. Brewster is set in 1968, a year after the summer of love and at the peak of the Vietnam War, but in small-town Brewster those events feel very far away. Describe the ways in which the novel evokes the late 1960s and brings that period to life. How has American culture changed in the fifty years since then in terms of racism, notions of acceptable behavior, and how teens get around and communicate?
6. Discuss the character of Karen Dorsey. What draws Ray and Jon to her, and she to them? What do you think made Karen choose Ray over Jon? If you were Karen, whom would you prefer?
7. Who’s your favorite adult character in Brewster? Falvo? Jimmy? Mr. Mosher? Someone else? Why?
8. Brewster can be characterized as a coming-of-age story. Describe the ways in which Jon, Ray, and Karen grow over the course of the novel. What do they each learn about themselves, the nature of love, and the wider world?
9. Describe how the novel treats first love. Did it feel real to you or remind you of the first time you fell in love?
10. Jon’s parents and Ray’s father all have dark pasts, and both families are abusive, though the abuse takes different forms. Are there parallels to be drawn between Jon and Ray’s families? Jon and Ray each find some acceptance with the other’s family. Discuss how this happened and why it makes sense.
11. What does running come to mean to Jon? Does it mean something different at the beginning of the novel than it does at the end?
12. In the final chapter, Jon says,
I thought about him over the years. Wondered, sometimes, if it could have all played differently. If we’d lost, maybe, before we started (279).
Discuss the ending of the novel. Do you think that Jon, Ray, and Karen were doomed from the start? In what ways will the characters escape Brewster, and in what ways will it never truly leave them? Do you feel that your own hometown has left an imprint on you?
(Questions issued by the publisher. )
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Lila
Marilynne Robinson, 2014
Farrar, Straus and Giroux
272 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780374187613
Summary
Marilynne Robinson, one of the greatest novelists of our time, returns to the town of Gilead in an unforgettable story of a girlhood lived on the fringes of society in fear, awe, and wonder.
Lila, homeless and alone after years of roaming the countryside, steps inside a small-town Iowa church—the only available shelter from the rain—and ignites a romance and a debate that will reshape her life. She becomes the wife of minister, John Ames, and begins a new existence while trying to make sense of the life that preceded her newfound security.
Neglected as a toddler, Lila was rescued by Doll, a canny young drifter, and brought up by her in a hardscrabble childhood. Together they crafted a life on the run, living hand to mouth with nothing but their sisterly bond and a ragged blade to protect them.
Despite bouts of petty violence and moments of desperation, their shared life was laced with moments of joy and love. When Lila arrives in Gilead, she struggles to reconcile the life of her makeshift family and their days of hardship with the gentle Christian worldview of her husband which paradoxically judges those she loves.
Revisiting the beloved characters and setting of Robinson’s Pulitzer Prize–winning Gilead and Home, a National Book Award finalist, Lila is a moving expression of the mysteries of existence that is destined to become an American classic. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—November 26, 1943
• Where—Sandpoint, Idaho, USA
• Education—B.A., Brown University
• Awards—PEN/Hemingway Award;National Book Critics Circle Award; Pulitzer Prize; Orange Prize
• Currently—Iowa City, Iowa
Marilynne Robinson was born and raised in Idaho, where her family has lived for several generations. She recieved a B.A. from Brown University in 1966 and a Ph.D. in English literature from the University of Washington in 1977.
Housekeeping, her first novel, was published in 1981 and won the PEN/Hemingway Award for First Fiction and the American Academy and Institute's Richard and Hinda Rosenthal Award. Mother Country, an examination of Great Britain's role in radioactive environmental pollution, was published in 1989. Robinson published Gilead in 2004 and Home in 2008. Home won the 2009 Orange Prize. She lives in Iowa City, Iowa, with her family. (From the publisher.)
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For someone who has labored long in the literary vineyard, Marilynne Robinson has produced a remarkably slim oeuvre. However, in this case, quality clearly trumps quantity. Her 1980 debut, Housekeeping, snagged the PEN/Hemingway Award for best first novel and was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.
Twenty-four years later, her follow-up novel, Gilead, won the National Book Critics Circle Award, the Ambassador Book Award, and the Pulitzer Prize. And in between, her controversial extended essay Mother Country: Britain, the Welfare State and Nuclear Pollution (1989) was shortlisted for the National Book Award.
Robinson is far from indolent. She teaches at several colleges and has written several articles for Harper's, Paris Review, the New York Times Book Review, and other publications. Still, one wonders—especially in the face of her great critical acclaim—why she hasn't produced more full-length works. When asked about these extended periods of literary dormancy, Robinson told Barnes & Noble.com, "I feel as if I have to locate my own thinking landscape... I have to do that by reading—basically trying to get outside the set of assumptions that sometimes seems so small or inappropriate to me." What that entails is working through various ideas that often don't develop because, as she says, "I couldn't love them."
Still, occasionally Robinson is able to salvage something important from the detritus—for example, Gilead's central character, Reverend John Ames. "I was just working on a piece of fiction that I had been fiddling with," Robinson explains. "There was a character whom I intended as a minor character... he was a minister, and he had written a little poem, and he transformed himself, and he became quite different—he became the narrator. I suddenly knew a great deal about him that was very different from what I assumed when I created him as a character in the first place."
This tendency of Robinson's to regard her characters as living, thinking beings may help to explain why her fictional output is so small. While some authors feel a deep compulsion to write daily, approaching writing as a job, Robinson depends on inspiration which often comes from the characters themselves. She explains, "I have to have a narrator whose voice tells me what to do—whose voice tells me how to write the novel."
As if to prove her point, in 2008, Robinson crafted the luminous novel Home around secondary characters from Gilead: John Ames's closest friend, Reverend Robert Boughton, his daughter Glory, and his reprobate son Jack. Paying Robinson the ultimate compliment, Kirkus Reviews declared that the novel "[c]omes astonishingly close to matching its amazing predecessor in beauty and power."
However, the deeply spiritual Robinson is motivated by a more personal directive than the desire for critical praise or bestsellerdom. Like the writing of Willa Cather—or, more contemporaneously, Annie Dillard—her novels are suffused with themes of faith, atonement, and redemption. She equates writing to prayer because "it's exploratory and you engage in it in the hope of having another perspective or seeing beyond what is initially obvious or apparent to you." To this sentiment, Robinson's many devoted fans can only add: Amen.
Extras
• Robinson doesn't just address religion in her writing. She serves as a deacon at the Congregational Church to which she belongs.
• One might think that winning a Pulitzer Prize could easily go to a writer's head, but Robinson continues to approach her work with surprising humility. In fact, her advice to aspiring writers is to always "assume your readers are smarter than you are."
• Robinson is no stranger to controversy. Mother Country, her indictment of the destruction of the environment and those who feign to protect it, has raised the ire of Greenpeace, which attempted to sue her British publisher for libel. (Author bio from Barnes & Noble.)
Book Reviews
Literary lioness Robinson—she's won a Pulitzer Prize for fiction, a Hemingway Foundation/PEN Award, and a National Book Critics Circle Award, among other laurels—continues the soaring run of novels with loosely connected story lines and deep religious currents that she launched a decade ago, almost a quarter century after her acclaimed fiction debut, Housekeeping . . . Lila's journey—its darker passages illuminated by Robinson's ability to write about love and the natural world with grit and graceful reverence—will mesmerize both longtime Robinson devotees and those coming to her work for the first time.
Elle
(Starred review.) This third of three novels set in the fictional plains town of Gilead, Iowa, is a masterpiece of prose in the service of the moral seriousness that distinguishes Robinson’s work. This time the narrative focuses on Lila, the young bride of elderly Reverend Ames, first met in Gilead.... Robinson carefully crafts this provocative and deeply meaningful spiritual search for the meaning of existence.
Publishers Weekly
(Starred review.) This is a lovely and touching story that grapples with the universal question of how God can allow his children to suffer. Recommended for fans of Robinson as well as those who enjoyed Elizabeth Strout's Olive Kitteridge, another exploration of pain and loneliness set against the backdrop of a small town. —Evelyn Beck
Library Journal
(Starred review.) Robinson has created a tour de force, an unforgettably dynamic odyssey, a passionate and learned moral and spiritual inquiry, a paean to the earth, and a witty and transcendent love story—all within a refulgent and resounding novel so beautifully precise and cadenced it wholly transfixes and transforms us. —Donna Seaman
Booklist
Robinson, ever the Calvinist (albeit a gentle and compassionate one), is a master at plumbing the roiling depths below calm surfaces. In this installment, she turns to the title character, Ames' wife, who has figured mostly just in passing in Gilead (2004) and Home (2008).... What secrets does she bear?.... Fans of Robinson will wish the book were longer—and will surely look forward to the next.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. The novel’s opening paragraphs vividly capture the deprivations experienced by young Lila. How do these experiences affect her immersion in the culture of Gilead? As she reaches adulthood,what does Lila believe about the nature of life?
2. How did your perception of Doll shift throughout the novel? What motivates her to rescue Lila? What do the two girls teach each other about loyalty and its limitations?
3. Lila recalls the day she ventured into John Ames’s candlelit church (echoing Ames’s tender recollection of that scene, which was presented in Gilead). Doane had told Lila, "Churches just want your money," yet she needed refuge. What does Ames’s church want from Lila?
4. As she copies difficult passages from the Bible, Lila continually returns to questions about human suffering and misfortune. What is your response to this debate? How does Lila’s practical wisdom compare to the philosophical wisdom of Ames and Boughton?
5. What is the significance of Doll’s knife—both literally (as a weapon) and as a metaphor? Can someone from Ames’s world of gentleness have the capacity to understand what the knife means to Lila?
6. What lies at the heart of Lila and Ames’s decision to marry? What needs and longings do they share? How does their relationship reflect the broader needs and longings of humanity?
7. Which of the novel’s Bible quotations resonated most strongly with you? How were you taught to approach a sacred text?
8. Does the age difference between Lila and Ames create an imbalance in their marriage?
9. How is Lila’s sense of self affected by her days in St. Louis? Was she wounded or empowered by that chapter of her life?
10. While Gilead and Home emphasize the relationships between fathers and their children (particularly their sons), Lila accentuates the perspective of women. How does this affect the storyline and the imagery?
11. What beliefs does Doll instill in Lila about nurturing a child?
12. Discuss the time and place depicted in Lila. What were your family’s circumstances during the mid-twentieth century? Is contemporary America less connected to the natural world and to the contemplative aspects of life? What insight can an urban reader in the Information Age gain from Lila and Ames?
13. Discuss the concept of trust as it plays out in Lila. What are the characters’ greatest barriers to trust? What does it take to quell such fear? Is it as simple as sharing all that we know—especially our most vulnerable moments? In the novel, how is trust distinguished from faith?
14. How does Lila reconcile her husband’s religious views with her life before she arrived in Gilead? Does she undergo a conversion in Gilead or does she arrive at something else entirely?
15. What do the closing lines of Lila tell us about life, and the absence of life?
(Questions issued by the publisher.)