Indiscretion
Charles Dubrow, 2013
HarperCollins
388 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780062201058
Summary
Every story has a narrator. Someone who writes it down after it's all over. Why am I the narrator of this story? I am because it is the story of my life—and of the people I love most.
Harry and Madeleine Winslow have been blessed with talent, money, and charm. Harry is a National Book Award–winning author on the cusp of greatness. Madeleine is a woman of sublime beauty and grace whose elemental goodness and serenity belie a privileged upbringing. Bonded by deep devotion, they share a love that is both envied and admired. The Winslows play host to a coterie of close friends and acolytes eager to bask in their golden radiance, whether they are in their bucolic East Hampton cottage, abroad in Rome thanks to Harry's writing grant, or in their comfortable Manhattan brownstone.
One weekend at the start of the summer season, Harry and Maddy, who are in their early forties, meet Claire and cannot help but be enchanted by her winsome youth, quiet intelligence, and disarming naivete. Drawn by the Winslows' inscrutable magnetism, Claire eagerly falls into their welcoming orbit. But over the course of the summer, her reverence transforms into a dangerous desire. By Labor Day, it is no longer enough to remain one of their hangers-on.
A story of love, lust, deception, and betrayal as seen through the omniscient eyes of Maddy's childhood friend Walter, a narrator akin to Nick Carraway in The Great Gatsby, Indiscretion is a juicy, richly textured novel filled with fascinating, true-to-life characters—an irresistibly sensual page-turner that explores having it all and the consequences of wanting more.
Indiscretion also marks the debut of a remarkably gifted writer and storyteller whose unique voice bears all the hallmarks of an exciting new literary talent. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—N/A
• Where—New York City, New York, USA
• Education—Weslyan University (no degree);
New York University
• Currently—New York City, New York
Charles Dubow was born in New York City and spent his summers at his family's house on Georgica Pond in East Hampton. He was educated at Wesleyan University and New York University. He has worked as a roustabout, a lumberjack, a sheepherder in New Zealand, and a congressional aide, and was a founding editor of Forbes.com and later an editor at Businessweek.com. He lives in New York City with his wife, Melinda; children, William and Lally; and Labrador retriever, Luke. This is his first novel. (From the publisher.)
Book Reviews
A smart, sensuous, and moving debut.... Delicious.... The characters exude a Jazz Age glamour.
O magazine
A cultural lament wrapped in a lesson about extramarital lust—a riveting read.
Daily Beast
Dubow tracks the fallout of an affair in his elegant debut centering on a golden couple, Harry and Maddy Winslow. He’s an award-winning writer, she’s a beautiful heiress; Walter Gervais, Maddy’s childhood friend and secret admirer, narrates the story. One weekend in the Hamptons, the Winslows meet Claire, a needy ingenue who develops a crush on the couple, especially Harry. Her role as hanger-on is severed when the Winslows leave for a year abroad, but Harry finds himself struggling with his next novel, and a chance encounter with Claire while on a business trip back to the U.S. launches him into a heady affair. Dubow draws the relationship perfectly—Claire is a giddy romantic, and Harry delights in playing the wealthy cosmopolitan. When Maddy discovers her husband’s betrayal, the four players form a miserable face-off, where Walter’s unrequited love bubbles to the surface in the face of Maddy’s grief, and Harry and Claire negotiate the affair’s relationship potential. Despite a disappointing and drawn-out ending, smart and observant writing makes the story well worth the ride.
Publishers Weekly
He's a National Book Award-winning author, she's kind and beautiful, and together they entertain friends at their elegant Manhattan brownstone and East Hampton cottage. But Harry and Madeleine Winslow are heading for trouble when they take charming young Claire under their wing. Great expectations for this work from New Yorker-to-the-bone Dubow.
Library Journal
Dubow crafts an epic novel of friendship, betrayal and undying love. It's a beautifully written debut. Walter Gervais is a true gentleman and childhood friend of Harry Winslow's wife, Maddy, and it's through his eyes that the story is told. Unobtrusive and playing a rather peripheral role, at least in the beginning, he delivers a balanced and fascinating account of the events that invariably change not only his friends' lives, but his own.... [T]he author chooses to add more unexpected layers to the story that elevate it from run-of-the-mill to outstanding. Dubow's book is a page turner that skillfully tugs at the heartstrings.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. What were your first impressions of Claire? Did they change over the course of the novel?
2. Describe each of the protagonists: Maddy, Harry, Claire, Walter. What drives each of them? What attracts them to the other? Is their outcome inevitable? How much are each responsible for the events that unfold?
3. Walter described the couple as being unselfish about their love. "They share it with so many people. It is what draws the rest of us to them." Talk about his comment. What is it about the Winslows' love that is so appealing? Would they have been better off being more selfish about their feelings?
4. What is Claire's relationship to the Winslows? Why are they so willing to adopt her into their circle? Were there any signs that Maddy should have seen?
5. Harry made up bedtime stories for his son, Johnny. One of Walter's favorites was about the Penguin King. Think about that bedtime story. How does it relate to the wider story told in Indiscretion?
6. In describing the indiscretion at the heart of the story, Walter refuses to cast blame. "Who can blame them? There are few things more powerful, more intoxicating than knowing there is someone who desires you utterly. And if it is illicit, secret, forbidden, that makes it all the more exciting. Who cares at that point about other people? Others don't matter when it is just the two of you in your own little lifeboat. Desire is all. Shame does not figure into it." Are you sympathetic to Walter's point of view? Do you share his understanding?
7. Madeleine is a wise and worldly woman. Why is she taken by surprise by Harry's actions? Should she—could she—have handled her reaction differently?
8. Were you surprised by the novel's twist? Why does Charles Dubow turn the story as he does?
9. Harry's father, an English teacher, believes that Harry suffered from hamartia—the fatal flaw. "When the hero does something stupid or wrong, the fates won't let him forget it." Is he right? Was Harry a heroic character? Or is Harry's father trying to make rational sense of the irrational as Walter thinks?
10. Why doesn't Walter have Harry's second book published? Was the decision truly his to make? At the novel's end, Walter meets Claire again and she tells him that the naiveté of youth shields her from blame. Do you agree with her? She also tells him, "The irony is that I won in the end. At least in a way I did." What does she think she won?
11. Indiscretion is narrated by Maddy and Harry's friend, Walter. How does this affect how the story is told? How would the story change if it were narrated by multiple voices or from another character's viewpoint? Choose a character, and retell a few scenes from his or her perspective. How does this affect how you read the novel and your impressions of the characters and their motives?
12. Is Walter a reliable narrator? Is he believable? How does he attempt to earn the reader's trust? He explains that he is the narrator, "because it is the story of my life—and of the people I love most." Is he right? Was his loyalty to Maddy actually a flaw that complicated or exacerbated matters?
(Questions issued by publisher.)
The Promise of Stardust
Priscille Sibley, 2013
HarperCollins
432 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780062194176
Summary
Matt Beaulieu was two years old the first time he held Elle McClure in his arms, seventeen when he first kissed her under a sky filled with shooting stars, and thirty-three when they wed. Now in their late thirties, the deeply devoted couple has everything—except the baby they've always wanted.
When a tragic accident leaves Elle brain-dead, Matt is devastated. Though he cannot bear losing her, he knows his wife, a thoughtful and adventurous scientist, feared only one thing—a slow death. Just before Matt agrees to remove Elle from life support, the doctors discover that she is pregnant. Now what was once a clear-cut decision becomes an impossible choice. Matt knows how much this child would have meant to Elle. While there is no certainty her body can sustain the pregnancy, he is sure Elle would want the baby to have a chance. Linney, Matt's mother, believes her son is blind with denial. She loves Elle, too, and insists that Elle would never want to be kept alive by artificial means, no matter what the situation.
Divided by the love they share, driven by principle, Matt and Linney fight for what each believes is right, and the result is a disagreement that escalates into a controversial legal battle, ultimately going beyond one family and one single life.
Told with sensitivity and compassion, The Promise of Stardust is an emotionally resonant and thought-provoking tale that raises profound questions about life and death, faith and medicine—and illuminates, with beauty and grace, the power of love to wound...and to heal. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
A few people always know what they want to do when they grow up. Priscille Sibley knew early on she would become a nurse. And a poet. Later, her love of words developed into a passion for storytelling.
Born and raised in Maine, Priscille has paddled down a few wild rivers, done a little rock climbing, and jumped out of airplanes. She currently lives in New Jersey where she works as a neonatal intensive care nurse and shares her life with her wonderful husband, three tall teenaged sons, and a mischievous Wheaten terrier. (From the author's website.)
Book Reviews
Sibley's debut dissects the ethics of a patient's right to die with dignity as a family is torn by a decision to terminate life support. Neurosurgeon Matt Beaulieu finally marries the love of his life, astrophysicist Elle McClure, having known her since he was two years old. After several miscarriages, the couple give up on the idea of having a baby, but when Elle falls and suffers severe head trauma, Matt's life falls completely apart. He knows her biggest fear was to die on life support, as her mother did. During preparations to remove her from life support, it's discovered that she is pregnant and if she remains connected she could potentially carry the fetus to term. Matt decides her desire to have a child would supersede her fear of life support, but his own mother takes him to court as executor of Elle's living will. Jake Sutter, Matt's college roommate, takes the case, using Matt's personal dilemma to serve his own prolife political agenda. The family's anguish is agonizing, each member doing what they believe to be Elle's desire or in her best interest, and while the ending is predictable, the journey is heartrending and tragic.
Publishers Weekly
There’s nothing like devastating moral quandary to spark reading, and this trade paperback original would be a great book club choice.
Library Journal
Sibley does a wonderful job of exploring a complex and controversial moral issue, skillfully giving both sides of the story…. This is a gripping, thoughtful, heart-wrenching, and well-written debut that would be a great discussion vehicle for certain book groups.
Booklist
While the novel is a fictionalized Schiavo-like intrafamily moral war, Sibley ups the ethical stakes by interweaving pregnancy with end-of-life issues. Characters are well-drawn, although the arrogant vindictiveness of Cunningham may be overblown. While she does take the easy way out regarding the end-of-life question, Sibley translates medical and legal issues solidly, bringing both emotion and reason into an examination of our collective failure to agree upon when life begins and ends. A literate and incandescent Nicholas Sparks-like love story complicated by intense moral and ethical questions.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1.As a neurosurgeon, Matt immediately realizes that Elle’s brain damage is severe. Why do you think he lets Phil operate? Do you think he betrays Elle by letting Phil do so? What about when Matt decides to keep his wife on life support?
2. Do you think Linney is overstepping her bounds when she opposes Matt’s decision to keep Elle on life support? How much of Linney’s behavior do you think is motivated by her experience as a nurse? Or by guilt over her decision not to intervene when Alice was dying/ suffering?
3. As teenagers, Matt and Elle find themselves about to have a baby. What do you think would have happened if Matt had approached his parents for help? Why doesn’t Matt’s dad, Dennis, do anything when he finds out Elle is pregnant? How do you think Hank would have reacted? Do you think Matt could have gone to one of his older brothers?
4. When Elle miscarries the first time, she says a name is important because it is the only thing they will ever be able to give the baby. Do you think it’s important to give a name to grief?
5. Matt wants to keep the court case private, but it becomes a media circus. How much influence does the media have on events like this? How much should they have? Is their involvement an expression of freedom of speech or is it an invasion of privacy?
6. Matt keeps talking to Elle while she’s in the hospital, even though he knows she can’t hear him. Why do you think he does that?
7. Elle says women are stronger because they can discuss their sadness and men feel as though they have to mask their pain and insecurities. Do you think that’s true?
8. Matt describes Adam as a controlling prick, but at another point Matt describes himself as a controlling spouse with a medical degree. Why would Elle choose two men who, on the surface, are quite different from each other? Or are they more similar than Matt believes?
9. Do you think Elle or Linney actually hastened Alice’s death? Do you think Matt would have actually gone to the authorities with Elle’s diary? Would you have given Alice an extra “dose” to relieve her suffering?
10. Matt tried desperately to resuscitate his and Elle’s stillborn son. How do you think that loss affected Matt? Elle? And, as a doctor, was Matt’s “failure” to save the baby a deeper loss for him?
11. Matt does not hold Christopher in high esteem. What do you think the origin of Matt’s animosity is? Do you think Christopher is aware of Matt’s feelings about him? Was Elle?
12. Why do you think Elle never gave Matt her medical power of attorney? Have you made an advanced directive? Who would you designate to make those decisions for you?
13. At the end of the story, Matt sees a fleeting figure in the trees and for a moment he thinks it is Elle. In the aftermath of loss, have you ever briefly forgotten that your loved one is gone? Do you believe some part of them stays with you forever?
14. In some states, pregnancy invalidates a woman’s advanced directive. Are you familiar with the laws in your state? Would you want to be kept on life support if you were pregnant?
(Questions issued by publisher.)
The Pretty One: A Novel about Sisters
Lucinda Rosenfeld, 2013
Little Brown & Co.
305 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780316213554
Summary
Perfect. Pretty. Political. For nearly forty years, The Hellinger sisters of Hastings-on-Hudson-namely, Imperia (Perri), Olympia (Pia), and Augusta (Gus)—have played the roles set down by their loving but domineering mother Carol.
Perri, a mother of three, rules her four-bedroom palace in Westchester with a velvet fist, managing to fold even fitted sheets into immaculate rectangles. Pia, a gorgeous and fashionable Chelsea art gallery worker, still turns heads after becoming a single mother via sperm donation. And Gus, a fiercely independent lawyer and activist, doesn't let her break-up from her girlfriend stop her from attending New Year's Day protests on her way to family brunch.
But the Hellinger women aren't pulling off their roles the way they once did. Perri, increasingly filled with rage over the lack of appreciation from her recently unemployed husband Mike, is engaging in a steamy text flirtation with a college fling. Meanwhile Pia, desperate to find someone to share in the pain and joy of raising her three-year-old daughter Lola, can't stop fantasizing about Donor #6103. And Gus, heartbroken over the loss of her girlfriend, finds herself magnetically drawn to Jeff, Mike's frat boy of a little brother. Each woman is unable to believe that anyone, especially her sisters, could understand what it's like to be her.
But when a freak accident lands their mother to the hospital, a chain of events is set in motion that will send each Hellinger sister rocketing out of her comfort zone, leaving her to wonder: was this the role she was truly born to play?
With The Pretty One, author Lucinda Rosenfeld does for siblings what she did for female friendship in I'm So Happy for You, turning her wickedly funny and sharply observant eye on the pleasures and punishments of lifelong sisterhood. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—December 31, 1969
• Where—New York, New York, USA
• Raised—Leona, New Jersey
• Education—Cornell University
• Currently—lives in Brooklyn, New York City
Lucinda Rosenfeld is an American writer and the author of four novels.
Her first novel, What She Saw in Roger Mancuso, Gunter Hopstock, Jason Barry Gold, Spitty Clark, Jack Geezo, Humphrey Fung, Claude Duvet, Bruce Bledstone, Kevin McFeeley, Arnold Allen, Pablo Miles, Anonymous 1-4, Nobody 5-8, Neil Schmertz, and Bo Pierce was published in 2000. The book follows the romantic travails of a girl named Phoebe Fine, beginning in elementary school and continuing into her mid-twenties. Each chapter revolves around (and is named after) a boy or man who played a role in Phoebe’s life. The book was excerpted in The New Yorker as a part of its Debut Fiction series (under the title, “The Male Gaze”).
In 2004 Rosenfeld published Why She Went Home , a sequel to What She Saw. . . The second novel centers around Phoebe’s return to her family’s suburban home at the age of thirty to care for her ailing mother and rethink her life’s goals.
Rosenfeld's third novel, I’m So Happy For You, published in 2009, is about competitive thirty-something best friends, Wendy Murman and Daphne Uberoff.
The Pretty Ones: A Novel about Sisters, published in 2013, centers on the rivalry among three sisters and their relationship with their controlling mother.
Rosenfeld's essays have appeared in: The New York Times Magazine, Creative Non-Fiction, New York magazine, Glamour and many other publications. Rosenfeld also wrote the "Friend or Foe" advice column for Slate.com from 2009 to 2012.
Personal
Rosenfeld grew up in Leonia, New Jersey, where she attended the Leonia Public Schools before going to the private Dwight-Englewood School for high school. At Cornell University, she majored in comparative literature.
Rosenfeld is married to economics writer John Cassidy of The New Yorker. They live in Brooklyn, New York and have two young daughters. (From Wikipedia.)
Book Reviews
While the title of Rosenfeld's latest would have you believe that this story revolves around Pia, the prettiest Hellinger daughter, the real focus is the incessant drama that drives a wedge between three sisters. All in their late 30s, the sisters continually bicker and attempt to one-up each other: middle child Pia is irked that Perri, the eldest with control issues and CEO of a home organization company, and Gus, a terrible gossip, found success in their respective fields while her own art career has floundered. Perri, a workaholic mother of three, lacks sympathy for Pia's single motherhood; she and Gus speculate about the identity of their niece Lola's father, while Pia still finds herself smarting over an ill-fated relationship with a married man. As Perri becomes increasingly shrewlike, she bristles at her unemployed husband's poor homemaking skills. Meanwhile, Gus's lover leaves her and, perplexingly, she finds herself pining for a man. The situation implodes when Gus spills the secret of Perri's impulsive blunder, and though a whopper of an event brings the sisters together, the book winds down to an unsatisfying nonending. Despite some occasionally stiff writing, Rosenfeld (I'm So Happy for You) does do a stellar job of developing each personality, and the characters remain true to their nature throughout.
Publishers Weekly
Although the novel's twists and turns are entertaining, it's the sisters' realistic swings from jealousy to unity that make it compelling.Once again, the author of I'm So Happy for You portrays women with insight.
Booklist
A sly novel about competition, jealousy and love as experienced by three sisters in New York. Imperia, Olympia and Augusta are not only saddled with their mother's obsession with ancient Greece, they are also victims of her penchant for criticism and categorization.... Old jealousies threaten to tear the sisters apart. A witty character study of that contentious organism: sisterhood.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions1.
1. Olympia is supposed to be "the pretty one" in her family, as well as "the flaky one," the chronically late one, and "the artistic one." To what extent do you think the labels are accurate? How do you think they've hindered or encouraged her progress in life? If you are a sister (or brother), what is your reputation in the family, and how do you think it has affected you as an adult?
2. Characterize the dynamic among the three Hellinger sisters when we first encounter them together on New Year's Day. Do you think they treat one another fairly? Unfairly? Explain.
3. What do you think of Olympia's having sought out information about the anonymous sperm donor she used to father a baby? In her circumstances, would you have done the same thing?
4. How does the Hellinger family dymamic seem to change after the sisters' mother, Carol, is struck by a falling streetlamp bulb? More generally, what do you think of the way Carol has raised her daughters?
5. Speaking of motherhood, what do you think of Perri's approach to raising kids? Do you think she's too uptight? What about Olympia's approach? In what ways are Perri and Olympia tryng to do things differently from how Carol did them?
6. Do you think Perri is justified walking out on Mike? How so?
7. How does the arrival of Jennifer Yu affect the Hellinger sisters? Do you think Olympia is right to forgive her father for what he did? Do you think Perri is right to be critical of Jennifer Yu for showing up at the house without an invitation?
8. Do you think Gus is meddling or accting out of love in going behind Olympia's back and trying to figure out who Lola's father is?
(Questions issued by publisher.)
The Myth of You and Me
Leah Stewart, 2005
Crown Publishing
320 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781400098071
Summary
When Cameron was fifteen, she and Sonia were best friends—so close it seemed nothing would ever come between them. Now Cameron is a twenty-nine-year-old research assistant with no meaningful ties to anyone except her aging boss, noted historian Oliver Doucet.
Nearly a decade after the incident that ended their friendship, Cameron receives an unexpected letter from her old friend. Despite Oliver’s urging, she doesn’t reply. But when he passes away, Cameron discovers that he has left her with one final task: to track down Sonia and hand-deliver a mysterious package to her.
The Myth of You and Me captures the intensity of a friendship as well as the real sense of loss that lingers after the end of one. Searingly honest and beautiful, it is a celebration and portrait of a friendship that will appeal to anyone who still feels the absence of that first true friend. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—1973
• Where—Laughlin Air Force Base, Texas, USA
• Raised—Virginia, Idaho, Kansas, New Mexico (USA); England, UK
• Education—B.A., Vanderbilt University; M.F.A., University of
Michigan
• Awards—National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship
• Currently—lives in Cincinnati, Ohio
Leah Stewart was born in 1973 at Laughlin Air Force Base in Texas, where her father was stationed. As a child, she lived in Virginia, Idaho, England, Kansas, and Virginia again. She went to high school in Clovis, New Mexico, a town featured in her second novel, The Myth of You and Me. She always wanted to be a writer, as evidenced by her college application essay.
At Vanderbilt University Leah was the editor of the student newspaper, the Vanderbilt Hustler, and spent summers interning for the Tennessean in Nashville and the Commercial Appeal in Memphis. The latter experience inspired her first novel, Body of a Girl. After college, Leah went to the MFA program at the University of Michigan, and then moved to Boston, where she put her master’s degree to work by taking a job as a secretary for the Harvard Graduate School of Education. She had an office with a door, and she wrote most of her first novel there.
Since then, Leah has worked as a secretary at Duke, a cataloguer in a used bookstore, a magazine editor, a copyeditor, and a staff member at the Sewanee Writers’ Conference. She has been a visiting professor at Vanderbilt University, Sewanee, and Murray State University. The recipient of a 2010 NEA Literature Fellowship, Leah teaches in the University of Cincinnati’s creative writing program, and lives in Cincinnati with her husband and two children. (From the author's website.)
Book Reviews
The Myth of You and Me is an intricately constructed, heartfelt story about the death of an intense friendship.
Boston Globe
A smart, exceedingly well-written story about the mysteries at the heart of even the most intimate friendships between women. You’ll be reading into the wee hours.
People
Stewart peers into the complicated heart of friendship in a moving second novel (after 2000's Body of a Girl). Ever since a cataclysmic falling out with her best friend, Sonia, after college, Cameron's closest companion has been Oliver, the 92-year-old historian she lives with and cares for in Oxford, Miss. Oliver's death leaves Cameron alone and adrift, until she discovers that he has given her one last task: she must track down her estranged best friend (whose letter announcing her engagement Cameron had so recently ignored) and deliver a mysterious present to her. Cameron's journey leads her back to the people, places and memories of their shared past, when they called themselves "Cameronia" and swore to be friends forever. It was a relationship more powerful than romantic love—yet romantic love (or sex, anyway) could still wreck it. Stewart lures the reader forward with two unanswered questions: What was the disaster that ended their friendship, and what will be revealed when Cameron and Sonia are together again and Oliver's package is finally opened? The book is heartfelt and its characters believable jigsaw puzzles of insecurities, talents and secrets, and if Cameron's carefully guarded anger makes her occasionally disagreeable, readers will nevertheless welcome her happy ending.
Publishers Weekly
Cameron Wilson, 14, is an overly tall army brat and a new kid in town. She begins an intense friendship with classmate Sonia Gray after the two meet while literally saving one another from disastrous situations. The friendship blows up in college.... Then a letter arrives from Sonia.... Cameron chooses to do nothing until Oliver dies and leaves a package for her to deliver personally to Sonia. So begins Camerons journey to find and understand her lost friend and, ultimately, herself. The novel unfolds at an unhurried, graceful pace, moving through flashbacks and memories...and Stewarts notion that friendship can define a life. A poignant and bittersweet story of love. —Jane Halsall, McHenry Public Library District, IL
School Library Journal
(Starred review.) At 30, Cameron Wilson lives in virtual seclusion with Oliver Doucet, an elderly historian who can't understand why the bright, beautiful young woman seems to be hiding from the world. When...Sonia Grey, sends Cameron a letter out of the blue,...Cameron refuses to answer.... Oliver passes away two months later, [and] he leaves behind a...package [Cameron] must deliver to Sonia.... Stewart's writing is sharp and observant, making this tale of the complexities of friendship affecting and genuine. Kristine Huntley
Booklist
Discussion Questions
1. How would you describe the relationship between Oliver and Cameron? Is it purely a familial one, or are there romantic undertones? What creates such a tight bond between them?
2. What do you think made Sonia write to Cameron? Can you imagine writing such a letter? What does Sonia mean when she says, “Sometimes without you to confirm these memories I feel like I’ve invented them”?
3. Oliver believes that “all times exist simultaneously,” a concept Cameron returns to several times over the course of the novel. What does Oliver mean by this? How is this notion at odds with Cameron’s statement, on page 215, that “once you know the end of the story, every part of the story contains that end, and is only a way of reaching it”? Which of these ideas strikes you as most true?
4. Why does Oliver force Cameron to seek out Sonia? What does he want for Cameron’s life?
5. On page 51, Cameron says, “To belong nowhere is a blessing and a curse, like any kind of freedom.” What do you make of this? How have her frequent moves shaped her? How have they affected her worldview? How might she be different if she’d lived her entire life in one place?
6. What connection does Cameron make between her personality and her height? How does she imagine her height causes others to see her?
7. What role does Sonia’s dyscalculia play in her life? How has it affected her idea of her herself? Her approach to the world? Why do you think she chooses to let Cameron in on this secret, and what’s the effect on Cameron when she tells her?
8. How are Cameron and Sonia shaped by their relationships with their parents?
9. Do you think that what Sonia did to end her friendship with Cameron is forgivable? Why or why not? Why do you think she did it? Why does Cameron find it so difficult to forgive? Is what Cameron did in response forgivable?
10. What draws Cameron to Will? Should Cameron be held responsible for her feelings for Will when he was Sonia’s boyfriend, even though she didn’t act on them? When she meets him again as an adult, why are her feelings so hard for her to express?
11. Sonia tells Cameron on page 205: “You’re a dreamer who doesn’t believe in the dream.” What does she mean by this? How do you see this play out in Cameron’s behavior?
12. Which of the two friends do you sympathize with more, Cameron or Sonia? At which points in the novel do you most sympathize with Sonia? With Cameron? At which points do you sympathize with them the least? Why?
13. In the prologue, Sonia tells Cameron that every decision we make affects the rest of our lives. Do you think this is true? What are the crucial decisions in Cameron’s life? Sonia’s? Oliver’s? Why did they make them?
14. Why are friendships between teenage girls so intense? What brings Cameron and Sonia together? What does each bring to the friendship? What does each get out of it?
15. On page 114, Cameron says that these intense teenage friendships can’t last. Is this true? Why or why not?
16. What kind of relationship do you imagine Sonia and Cameron having after the end of the novel? Have they begun a new phase of their friendship, or simply achieved closure?
(Questions issued by publisher.)
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The History of Us
Leah Stewart, 2013
Simon & Schuster
400 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780061128660
Summary
In the newest novel by the celebrated author of The Myth of You and Me (which Claire Messud called “poignant, fierce, and compelling”), three grown siblings return to their childhood home and face a family secret that forces them to reexamine their relationships to each other—and to the aunt who took them in as children.
Eloise Hempel is on her way to teach a class at Harvard when she receives a devastating phone call. Her sister and her husband have been killed in a tragic accident, and Eloise must return home to Cincinnati to take their three children, Theodora, Josh, and Claire, out of the hands of her own incapable mother. She moves back into her mother’s century-old house and, after her mother leaves, pours her own money into its upkeep.
Nearly two decades later, Eloise is still in that house with now-grown Theo, Josh, and Claire, still thinking about the career and life she left behind, even as she pushes the kids to get a move on. With Claire leaving for New York City for a promising ballet career, Eloise has plans to finally sell the house and start a life that’s hers alone. But when her mother creates a competition for which of them gets the house and Claire turns out to have a life-changing secret, their makeshift family begins to fall apart.
The History of Us is a heartrending story of loss, sibling relationships, and the life you make in the path not taken. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—1973
• Where—Laughlin Air Force Base, Texas, USA
• Raised—Virginia, Idaho, Kansas, New Mexico (USA); England, UK
• Education—B.A., Vanderbilt University; M.F.A., University of
Michigan
• Awards—National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship
• Currently—lives in Cincinnati, Ohio
Leah Stewart was born in 1973 at Laughlin Air Force Base in Texas, where her father was stationed. As a child, she lived in Virginia, Idaho, England, Kansas, and Virginia again. She went to high school in Clovis, New Mexico, a town featured in her second novel, The Myth of You and Me. She always wanted to be a writer, as evidenced by her college application essay.
At Vanderbilt University Leah was the editor of the student newspaper, the Vanderbilt Hustler, and spent summers interning for the Tennessean in Nashville and the Commercial Appeal in Memphis. The latter experience inspired her first novel, Body of a Girl. After college, Leah went to the MFA program at the University of Michigan, and then moved to Boston, where she put her master’s degree to work by taking a job as a secretary for the Harvard Graduate School of Education. She had an office with a door, and she wrote most of her first novel there.
Since then, Leah has worked as a secretary at Duke, a cataloguer in a used bookstore, a magazine editor, a copyeditor, and a staff member at the Sewanee Writers’ Conference. She has been a visiting professor at Vanderbilt University, Sewanee, and Murray State University. The recipient of a 2010 NEA Literature Fellowship, Leah teaches in the University of Cincinnati’s creative writing program, and lives in Cincinnati with her husband and two children. (From the author's website.)
Book Reviews
Touching drama.... Faced with urgent choices, Eloise and the grown kids react with varying degrees of wisdom and pigheadedness, but as Stewart tenderly demonstrates, they remain – for better or worse—a family.
People
In Stewart’s new novel (after The Myth of You and Me), Eloise Hempel, at 45, is a history professor whose rising career is derailed when her sister dies, leaving her custody of her sister’s three children. Eloise returns home to Cincinnati, Ohio, where she does her best to raise Theodora, 11; middle-child Josh, and two-year-old Claire in her family’s large, enviable home. Seventeen years later, her sister’s children now adults, Eloise reveals her plan to sell the house and, maybe, move in with Heather, her secret girlfriend. But Theo, Josh, and Claire, none of whom want the house to be sold, confront Eloise, each other, and themselves; in trying to come to terms with adulthood and responsibility, they are all nearly ripped apart. Stewart’s novel is an intimate exploration of a family in crisis and the different ways in which people cope with grief. While the plot meanders and the characters seem paralyzed with indecision, readers will empathize with their plight. Unfortunately, the combination of a melodramatic story line and a focus on minutiae make for a forgettable read.
Publishers Weekly
Stewart (The Myth of You and Me) has a knack for introducing characters in need of mending: they are not broken, just disjointed, needy, and, at times, without emotional support. Eloise Hempel is the de facto mother to three twentysomething siblings...for 20 years.... Looking toward future domestic arrangements, Eloise slowly hedges toward momentous decisions, while the siblings dabble in their own decision making, sometimes with disastrous results. Verdict: Domestic fiction fans favoring strong, intelligent characters will be intrigued by Stewart's introspective examination of a family. —Andrea Tarr, Corona P.L., CA
Library Journal
Stewart is a wonderful observer of family relationships, and she adroitly weaves the stories of Eloise and the children she’s raised—their work, their loves, their disappointments and dreams—while focusing on what ties families together, and what ultimately keeps those ties from breaking.
BookPage
A poignant exploration of the meaning of family…the life they’ve lived was as much a gift as the life they lost.
Booklist
A professor who raised her late sister's three children grapples with the long-term consequences. At 28, Eloise is a rising star in Harvard's history department, having just published a much acclaimed book. She's prepared for a fulfilling academic career but not for the phone call she receives from her 11-year-old niece, Theo, telling her...the children's vacationing parents have perished in a helicopter crash, and their grandmother, Francine, is lying in bed, unable to cope.... Seventeen years later, the makeshift family is at a turning point.... With a playwright's precise, sometimes excoriating dialogue and an insightful novelist's judicious use of interior monologue, Stewart crafts a tearful yet unsentimental family coming-of-age story.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. Why did Eloise return to Cincinnati rather than have Theo, Josh, and Claire move to Boston? Do you think she made the right decision? Why or why not? What would you have done if you were in Eloise’s position?
2. Describe Eloise’s individual relationships with Theo, Josh, and Claire. What makes each relationship unique? What are the specific strains on each relationship? Do you think Eloise treats her adopted nieces and nephew differently? Did any of these relationships remind you of relationships in your own life?
3. Eloise “tried without success to break Theo of her fondness for their hometown.” (pg. 24) Why is Eloise adamant that Theo leave Cincinnati? Why does Theo believe that Josh, but not she herself, “should be in a bigger city” and “leading a bigger life” (pg. 57)?
4. What were Josh’s motivations for quitting his band and returning to Cincinnati? In what ways did Josh’s tempestuous situation with Sabrina affect his relationship with Theo? Did you understand his reasons for not telling Adelaide about Blind Robots?
5. How is Claire’s departure a turning point for Eloise, Theo, and Josh? Why does Claire not tell her family about her change of plans? Do you think Theo, Josh, and Eloise were more upset by her decision to quit ballet or by her deception?
6. What does the house “on Clifton Avenue near the intersection with Lafayette” (pg. 15) symbolize to each character? Do you think Eloise’s desire to be “unburdened” (pg. 76) by it due more to financial or emotional considerations? Have you ever felt a similar, conflicted connection to a certain place or city?
7. “It’s like she wants to sell our childhood” (pg 93), Theo says about Eloise’s desire to sell the house. Did you empathize more with Eloise or with Theo? Was Eloise justified in kicking Theo and Josh out of the house? Why or why not?
8. Discuss Francine’s character. What were your initial reactions to her? How did she change over the course of the novel? What were her motivations for creating a “competition” for the house? Why does Eloise ultimately come to sympathize her mother?
9. Why does Eloise insist on keeping her relationship with Heather a secret from her family and her colleagues? Is she ashamed of being in a romantic relationship with a woman, as Heather claims?
10. “These children are not mine, she thought. This fact, which at times had come with a pang of sorrow, now brought her comfort. She was just their aunt. If the world had turned as it should, she’d be nothing but a voice on the phone.” (pg. 225) Discuss your reactions to this passage. Do you understand Eloise’s resentment? What is your perception of Eloise as a parent, especially considering the circumstances of how she came into the role?
11. In what ways is Eloise’s trip to Chicago a pivotal moment for her? Why does she ultimately decide to stay in Cincinnati? Do you think she makes this choice for Heather, for her family, or for herself?
12. In what ways are each of the characters at a crossroads in their lives—both regarding their careers and romantic relationships? How does the loss of their parents continue to affect Theo, Josh, and Claire in adulthood and influence the decisions they make?
13. On pg 346 Theo wonders: “Why was it so hard to tell the difference between what you thought you wanted, and what you wanted?” What do you think she actually wants in life? Does she figure it out in the end? Have you ever been in a similar situation?
14. What kind of responsibility, if any, do parents have for their adult children? Are Eloise’s responsibilities for her grown-up nieces and nephew less since, as she says, she “inherited” them? What are your thoughts about Eloise’s assertion that Theo feels entitled to the house “because, these days in America, not until children have children of their own do they feel any gratitude to the people who raised them”? (pg. 130)
15. Discuss the way Cincinnati is described and portrayed in the novel. Have you ever visited or lived in Cincinnati? Did you think the descriptions were accurate? Discuss the connection between identity and place. How does the place where you live define you as a person? How has your setting affected your life?
16. The History of Us concludes with some significant issues in the characters’ lives left unresolved. What do you think the future holds for Eloise, Theo, Josh, and Claire? Do you think The History of Us is an accurate portrayal of family relationships?
(Questions issued by publisher.)
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