The Wedding Officer
Anthony Capella, 2006
Random House
544 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780553384635
Summary
In the sumptuous tradition of Chocolat and Captain Corelli's Mandolin, and already optioned for a major motion picture, comes a magical tale of romantic passion, culinary delight—and Italy.
Captain James Gould arrives in wartime Naples assigned to discourage marriages between British soldiers and their gorgeous Italian girlfriends. But the innocent young officer is soon distracted by an intoxicating young widow who knows her way around a kitchen...Livia Pertini is creating feasts that stun the senses with their succulence—ruby-colored San Marzana tomatoes, glistening anchovies, and delectable new potatoes encrusted with the black volcanic earth of of Campania—and James is about to learn that his heart may rank higher than his orders.
For romance can be born of the sweet and spicy passions of food and love—and time spent in the kitchen can be as joyful and exciting as the banquet of life itself. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—1962
• Where—Uganda, Africa
• Education—Oxford University
• Currently—lives in London
Anthony Capella was born in Uganda, Africa in 1962. He was educated at St Peter’s College, Oxford, where he graduated with a First in English Literature.
The Food of Love, his first novel, was a Richard and Judy Summer Read in the UK. It has been translated into nineteen languages and has been optioned for the screen by Warner. His second novel, The Wedding Officer, was an international bestseller and is being made into a film by New Line. His third novel The Various Flavours of Coffee was released 2008 and The Empress of Ice Cream in 2010. (From the the author's website.)
Book Reviews
London-based culinarian Capella (Food of Love) returns with the WWII-era story of Livia Pertini, a beautiful young widow who leaves her family's destitute country osteria to try to find work in Naples. There, English Capt, James Gould has been assigned the task of discouraging British soldiers from marrying Italian women, many of whom have turned to prostitution in order to survive. At first Gould is a stickler for the rules, closing down restaurants and denying couples permission to marry. But when Angelo, the maitre d' at restaurant Zi'Teresa, tricks him into hiring Livia as the officers' cook, things loosen up considerably. Capella celebrates war-torn pleasures of the flesh with a winning in-the-moment lightness.
Publishers Weekly
Like his debut, The Food of Love, Capella's second novel is a sensory delight, highlighting the relationship between culinary pleasures and sensual romance. Wartime Naples is the setting for an unlikely love affair, which begins when British captain James Gould meets Livia Pertini, a widow who becomes James's cook. James is the so-called Wedding Officer, the soldier who approves marriage requests between local Italian women and British men, and humor is never in short supply as he repeatedly encounters prostitutes desiring to make advantageous marriages. With Livia, James experiences passion not only through their physical desire but also through Livia's food, with its rich colors and satisfying flavors. The trauma of wartime strains their relationship, however, especially when Livia must barter with an unsavory man in order to obtain medication for her ailing father. Capella's original tale is an expertly crafted work of women's fiction, complete with captivating characters and scintillating romance. Recommended for all public libraries.
Library Journal
Capella's vividly sensuous command of the arts of both food and romance will attract readers. —Mark Knoblauch
Booklist
Capella mingles amore with alimenti in this tale of a British officer who develops an appetite for all things Italian. In February 1944, Captain James Gould is sent to Naples to enforce an army policy discouraging British soldiers from marrying Italian natives. The inexperienced officer is quickly put on the offensive when confronted with bribes and brides. James clamps down on the black market and takes a hard line when dealing with locals. They devise a ploy to soften his governance by attacking his taste buds: "A man who has eaten well-he's at peace with the world . . . he wants other people to be happy." So the black marketers place beautiful and talented cook Livia Pertini in James's kitchen. He tries to resist (it's career suicide, after all), but soon the young officer is under her spell. James reverses his stance and starts approving batches of marriage applications; he even aids the locals as they attempt to reopen businesses. Livia is standoffish at first-she's a recent widow, and the Allies treated her family vilely-but eventually she succumbs to James's clumsy seductions. Capella does a capable job capturing the essence of war-torn Italy, but his prose becomes transcendent when he pours his heart into telling the story of Italian food. Readers will appreciate the recipes for sugo (a basic tomato sauce) and other classic Italian dishes; even the most fastidious dieter may consider a pasta binge. Disappointingly, the love story isn't as appetizing as Livia's fettuccine al limone. An overwrought romance spoils a lovely feast for the senses.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. What aspects of Livia’s personality are illustrated in the novel’s opening scenes? What parts of her identity fade after Enzo leaves, and what aspects are intensified when she is on her own?
2. Discuss the different types of hunger described in The Wedding Officer. Which ones are the most powerful—the hunger for companionship, food, or sex? In what way do James’s and Livia’s appetites change throughout the novel?
3. Why did James’s superiors believe it was necessary to regulate the marriages between servicemen and their Italian girlfriends? What did the interview questions indicate about the gulf between reality and pretense during this episode in history?
4. Chapter twenty-one ends with Livia feeling furious because of James’s apparent lack of interest. What do their different approaches to courtship say about their cultures?
5. Initially, James says that he doesn’t have much authority. What power does he really have? What does his experience indicate about a person’s ability to make change, regardless of what the official limitations are?
6. Discuss the issue of language as it plays out in the novel. How does it help and hinder the characters to have limitations in their ability to communicate? In what ways is food a universal language? What did James’s “food language,” which forbade things like garlic and emphasized potatoes over pasta, say about his personality?
7. Livia highlights the sensual pleasures of food when she serves the officers snails and peas, all still in their shells. What other ways does she have of using food to seduce?
8. How familiar were you with Italy’s experience with the war, and the rise of Mussolini? What aspects of history and culture in The Wedding Officer surprised you?
9. How did the economics of war become a sort of weapon as well? Was James right to try to eliminate the black market? How does corruption become defined under these circumstances? Beyond the issue of nutrition, what does it do to a community to deprive them of their national cuisine?
10. In chapter thirty, James is exasperated to discover that Livia doesn’t measure any of her ingredients. What turning points does this scene capture? What do they eventually teach each other about intuition and rules?
11. Livia deeply resents the Allies. What does her story demonstrate about the role of liberators in a foreign land?
12. Would you have given in to Alberto’s demands if you had been in Livia’s position? Was the survival of her family always the top priority in her life?
13. Livia tells James she is adamant in her support of communism. What aspects of history are captured in this conversation? What makes communism so appealing to her? What is her understanding of its promise?
(Questions issued by publisher.)
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The Magician's Assistant
Ann Patchett, 1997
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
368 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780156006217
Summary
When Parsifal, a handsome and charming magician, dies suddenly, his widow Sabine—who was also his faithful assistant for twenty years—learns that the family he claimed to have lost in a tragic accident is very much alive and well. Sabine is left to unravel his secrets, and the adventure she embarks upon, from sunny Los Angeles to the bitter windswept plains of Nebraska, will work its own magic on her. Sabine's extraordinary tale captures the hearts of its readers just as Sabine is captured by her quest. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio• Birth—December 2, 1963
• Where—Los Angeles, California, USA
• Raised—Nashville, Tennessee
• Education—B.A., Sarah Lawrence College; M.F.A., University of Iowa
• Awards—Guggenheim Fellowship; PEN/Faulkner Award; Orange Prize
• Currently—lives in Nashville, Tennessee
Ann Patchett is an American author of both fiction and nonfiction. She is perhaps best known for her 2001 novel, Bel Canto, which won her the Orange Prize and PEN/Faulkner Award and brought her nationwide fame.
Patchett was born in Los Angeles, California, and raised in Nashville, Tennessee. Her mother is the novelist Jeanne Ray. Her father, Frank Patchett, who died in 2012 and had been long divorced from her mother, served as a Los Angeles police officer for 33 years, and participated in the arrests of both Charles Manson and Sirhan Sirhan. The story of Patchett's own family is the basis for her 2016 novel, Commonwealth, about the individual lives of a blended family spanning five decades.
Education and career
Patchett attended St. Bernard Academy, a private Catholic school for girls run by the Sisters of Mercy. Following graduation, she attended Sarah Lawrence College and took fiction writing classes with Allan Gurganus, Russell Banks, and Grace Paley. She managed to publish her first story in The Paris Review before she graduated. After college, she went on to the Iowa Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa
For nine years, Patchett worked at Seventeen magazine, writing primarily non-fiction; the magazine published one of every five articles she wrote. She said that the magazine's editors could be cruel, but she eventually stopped taking criticism personally. She ended her relationship with the magazine following a dispute with one editor, exclaiming, "I’ll never darken your door again!"
In 1990-91, Patchett attended the Fine Arts Work Center in Provincetown, Massachusetts. It was there she wrote The Patron Saint of Liars, which was published in 1992 (becoming a 1998 TV movie). It was where she also met longtime friend Elizabeth McCracken—whom Patchett refers to as her editor and the only person to read her manuscripts as she is writing.
Although Patchett's second novel Taft won the Janet Heidinger Kafka Prize in fiction in 1994, her fourth book, Bel Canto, was her breakthrough novel. Published in 2001, it was a National Book Critics Circle Award Finalist and won the PEN/Faulkner Award and Britain's Orange Prize.
In addition to her other novels and memoirs, Patchett has written for publications such as The New York Times Magazine, Washington Post, Oprah Magazine, ELLE, GQ, Gourmet, and Vogue. She is the editor of the 2006 volume of the anthology series The Best American Short Stories.
Personal
Patchett was only six when she moved to Nashville, Tennessee, and she lives there still. She is particularly enamored of her beautiful pink brick home on Whitland Avenue where she has lived since 2004 with her husband and dog. When asked by the New York Times where would she go if she could travel anywhere, Patchett responded...
I've done a lot of travel writing, and people like to ask me where I would go if I could go anyplace. My answer is always the same: I would go home. I am away more than I would like, giving talks, selling books, and I never walk through my own front door without thinking: thank-you-thank-you-thank-you.... [Home is] the stable window that opens out into the imagination.
In 2010, when she found that her hometown of Nashville no longer had a good book store, she co-founded Parnassus Books with Karen Hayes; the store opened in November 2011. In 2012, Patchett was on Time magazine's list of the 100 most influential people in the world. She is a vegan for "both moral and health reasons."
In an interview, she once told Barnes and Noble that the book that influenced her writing more than any other was Humboldt's Gift by Saul Bellow.
I think I read it in the tenth grade. My mother was reading it. It was the first truly adult literary novel I had read outside of school, and I read it probably half a dozen times. I found Bellow's directness very moving. The book seemed so intelligent and unpretentious. I wanted to write like that book.
Books
1992 - The Patron Saint of Liars
1994 - Taft
1997 - The Magician's Assistant
2004 - Truth and Beauty: A Friendship
2001 - Bel Canto
2007 - Run
2008 - What Now?
2011 - State of Wonder; The Getaway Car: A Practical Memoir About Writing and Life
2013 - This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage
2016 - Commonwealth
2019 - The Dutch House
(Author bio adapted from Wikipedia. Retrieved 9/5/2016.)
Book Reviews
The kindliness of The Magician's Assistant is beguiling, and Patchett is an adroit, graceful writer.... She is especially practiced at the razzle-dazzle of odd juxtapositions.
Suzanne Berne - New York Times
Patchett's third novel is something of a magic trick itself—a 90s love story wrought with the same grace and classic charm of a 19th-century novel.... We read Patchett's novel with the same pleasure and awe of an audience watching a chained Houdini escape from an underwater chamber.
Newsweek
This beautifully realized tale suggests that even a woman skilled in the art of magic cannot fool herself.
Glamour
After working as his assistant for more than 20 years, Sabine marries her beloved boss, Parcifal, knowing that he's gay and has just lost his lover. What she doesn't find out until after his death from AIDS is that Parcifal was actually Guy Fettera from Alliance, Neb., and had a family he never spoke about. Karen Ziemba creates an appropriately light tone for the narrator, despite some dark events that Sabine discovers when she visits Parcifal's sweet, dysfunctional family. She crafts clear, flat Midwest accents for the magician's mother and sisters and her pace and annunciation are excellent. Ziemba's men all sound alike, but they play minimal roles. She is an experienced and professional reader with just the right stuff for Patchett's 1997 novel, which probes the complex motives of Parcifal and his assistant.
Publishers Weekly
For two decades, Sabine has loved the magician Parsifal and served as his assistant. Theirs is an unorthodox relationship, however, for Parsifal loves men. When Parsifal's lover dies of AIDS, he marries Sabine so that she will be his widow. When Parsifal dies, Sabine receives some surprising news about his will. Believing her husband to have no living relatives, she is shocked to learn of a trust fund established for a mother and two sisters in Nebraska. When his family contacts her, she introduces them to the Los Angeles Parsifal. She then visits them in Nebraska to discover the truth about the man she loved and thought she knew, gaining insight into herself as well. Well written and full of interesting twists, this is recommended for larger collections. —Kimberly G. Allen, network MCI Lib., Washington, DC
Library Journal
Having produced wonders in two earlier novels (The Patron Saint of Liars; Taft), Patchett here conjures up a striking tale of pain and enchantment as an L.A. woman, who lost the love of her life after a few short months of marriage, finds unexpected consolation from her husband's family—a family she never knew he had. When Parsifal the Magician died suddenly of an aneurism, he left his assistant of 22 years, the statuesque Sabine, whom he'd recently married after his longtime gay partner Phan's death, heartbroken and numb. He also left a rude surprise: The family he always spoke of as dead is in fact alive and well in Alliance, Nebraska—and his mother and younger sister are soon on their way to see Sabine. Seemingly decent folk, the two women return home leaving her mystified as to why Parsifal (born Guy Fetters) would have denied their existence. And so, lonely and still paralyzed with grief, Sabine decides to visit them in the dead of a Nebraska winter, hoping for relief and some answers. She gets more than she bargained for when older sister Kitty, herself married to an abusive husband, reveals that Parsifal had accidentally killed his father in trying to keep him from beating their pregnant mother. After he did time in the reformatory, his family lost touch with him completely—until one night when they saw him and Sabine on the Johnny Carson Show. The nightly replay of a video of that show became a family ritual of hope, especially for Kitty's two boys, now teenagers as desperate to get away as their uncle had been. Sabine, quite a magician herself, begins a process of healing for them all, and with it comes realization of the hope that the family had long cherished. Masterful in evoking everything from the good life in L.A. to the bleaker one on the Great Plains, and even to dreams of the dead: a saga of redemption tenderly and terrifically told.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. Sabine never had the kind of passionate love with Parsifal that her mother has with her father and that Bertie has with Haas. Is it possible to be happy in a marriage without it? Was Sabine genuinely happy with Parsifal? Dot tells Sabine she has never experienced this kind of passion either. Do you think finding your true love is destiny or luck?
2. The settings of this novel play an important role in defining the characters. Los Angeles is a city where "there are no laws against pre-tending to be something you weren't." Considering that he was born in a conservative Midwestern town and that he killed his father there, was the illusion Parsifal created about his past understandable or was he selfish? If Parsifal had been born and raised in New York City or Chicago, would his illusion have been necessary?
3. Sabine's dreams help her journey through her grief. She believes that "sometimes it was possible for someone to come back." Do you think Phan and Parsifal are really coming back from the "beyond" in her dreams? Why is it Phan and not Parsifal whom she dreams about first? Why do you think Sabine was able to have such a good relationship with her husband's lover when he was alive?
4. On the plane to Nebraska, Sabine looks out of the window and reflects that "it looked like a world she would build herself, the order and neatness of miniature." What is she revealing about herself? Are the miniature buildings she creates saying something important about her personality or is that just her job? When her airplane is struck by violent turbulence, she thinks dying then wouldn't be so terrible. Do you think Sabine really wants to die?
5. The first magic trick that Sabine performs in Nebraska is when she pulls an egg out from behind Dots ear. What is significant about her doing this trick at this very moment? Gradually, Sabine performs more and more magic tricks. What is happening to her emotionally that the magic reveals? Is she discovering something about her own ability or is she simply carrying on for Parsifal?
6. Watching the Johnny Carson video is like a religion for Dot's family. Why is it so important to them? Sabine watches it with them twice. While watching it the first time what does she realize about their magic act and her role as the magician's assistant? How is her reaction different the second time she watches it, and why?
7. Sabine finally dreams about Parsifal. But at first she thinks that he is Kitty. Was this just a mistake because they look so much alike or is it more meaningful? Do you think that Sabine and Kitty are really gay? Do you think they would have fallen in love had each of them not loved Parsifal? Kitty says that she dreams of Parsifal and Phan too. Are we supposed to think that Parsifal has somehow brought them together?
8. A big part of a magician's trick is the skillful manipulation of the audience. Is Sabine manipulating the Fetters? When she performs the card trick that enrages Howard, do you think it was an honest mistake? Do you think Kitty leaves him simply because he hurts Bertie? Do you think that if Howard had been a better husband and father Kitty and Sabine would have fallen in love?
9. At Bertie's wedding, Sabine does Parsifal's card trick from her dream. Is there a secret to this trick or is it really "magic"? She tells her assistant at the wedding that she doesn't know how she pulled it off. Is Sabine telling the truth? In her dream Parsifal's card trick causes great excitement, but at the wedding the guests are more impressed by how she shuffles the cards. Why doesn't this disappoint Sabine?
10. The Magician's Assistant begins, "Parsifal is dead. That is the end of the story." Is Parsifal s death really the end of the story? In her last dream, Sabine waves goodbye to him. Do you think she will dream about Parsifal again? Do you think Kitty will finally leave Al and go to Los Angeles with Sabine?
(Questions issued by publisher.)
Return to Sullivans Island
Dorothea Benton Frank, 2009
HarperCollins
384 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780061891755
Summary
Dorothea Benton Frank returns to the enchanted landscape of South Carolina's Lowcountry made famous in her beloved New York Times bestseller Sullivans Island to tell the story of the next generation of Hamiltons and Hayes.
Newly graduated from college, aspiring writer Beth Hayes is elected by her family to house-sit the Island Gamble. Buoyed by sentimental memories of growing up on this tiny sandbar seemingly untouched by time, Beth vows to give herself over to the Lowcountry force and discover the wisdom it holds. Just as she vows she will never give into the delusional world of white picket fences, minivans, and eternal love, she meets Max Mitchell. All her convictions and plans begin to unravel with lightning speed.
There is so much about life and her family's past that she does not know. Her ignorance and naivete nearly cost her both her inheritance and her family's respect, but Beth finds unexpected friends to help her through the disaster she faces. If everything happens for a reason, then Beth's return to Sullivans Island teaches her that betrayal and tragedy are most easily handled when you surround yourself with loyal family and friends in a magical place that loves you so much it wants to claim you as its own. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—1951
• Where—Sullivan's Island, North Carolina, USA
• Education—Fashion Institute of America
• Currently—lives in New Jersey and on Sullivan Island
An author who has helped to put the South Carolina Lowcountry on the literary map, Dorothea Benton Frank hasn't always lived near the ocean, but the Sullivan's Island native has a powerful sense of connection to her birthplace. Even after marrying a New Yorker and settling in New Jersey, she returned to South Carolina regularly for visits, until her mother died and she and her siblings had to sell their family home. "It was very upsetting," she told the Raleigh News & Observer. "Suddenly, I couldn't come back and walk into my mother's house. I was grieving."
After her mother's death, writing down her memories of home was a private, therapeutic act for Frank. But as her stack of computer printouts grew, she began to try to shape them into a novel. Eventually a friend introduced her to the novelist Fern Michaels, who helped her polish her manuscript and find an agent for it.
Published in 2000, Frank's first "Lowcountry tale," Sullivan's Island made it to the New York Times bestseller list. Its quirky characters and tangled family relationships drew comparisons to the works of fellow southerners Anne Rivers Siddons and Pat Conroy (both of whom have provided blurbs for Frank's books). But while Conroy's novels are heavily angst-ridden, Frank sweetens her dysfunctional family tea with humor and a gabby, just-between-us-girls tone. To her way of thinking, there's a gap between serious literary fiction and standard beach-blanket fare that needs to be filled.
"I don't always want to read serious fiction," Frank explained to The Sun News of Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. "But when I read fiction that's not serious, I don't want to read brain candy. Entertain me, for God's sake." Since her debut, she has faithfully followed her own advice, entertaining thousands of readers with books Pat Conroy calls "hilarious and wise" and characters Booklist describes as "sassy and smart,."
These days, Frank has a house of her own on Sullivan's Island, where she spends part of each year. "The first thing I do when I get there is take a walk on the beach," she admits. Evidently, this transplanted Lowcountry gal is staying in touch with her soul.
Extras
From a Barnes & Noble interview:
• Before she started writing, Frank worked as a fashion buyer in New York City. She is also a nationally recognized volunteer fundraiser for the arts and education, and an advocate of literacy programs and women's issues.
• Her definition of a great beach read—"a fabulous story that sucks me in like a black hole and when it's over, it jettisons my bones across the galaxy with a hair on fire mission to convince everyone I know that they must read that book or they will die."
• When asked about her favorite books, here is what she said:
After working your way through all of F. Scott Fitzgerald, Jane Austen, Eudora Welty, Tennessee Williams, Flannery O'Connor, of course, you have to read Gone with the Wind a billion times, then [tackle these authors].
The Water is Wide by Pat Conroy; To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee; The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood; A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley; The Red Tent by Anita Diamant; Ladder of Years by Anne Tyler; Brunelleschi's Dome by Ross King; Making Waves and The Sunday Wife by Cassandra King; Islands by Anne Rivers Siddons; Rich in Love, Fireman's Fair, Dreams of Sleep, and Nowhere Else on Earth (all three) by Josephine Humphrey. (Author bio and interview from Barnes and Noble.)
Book Reviews
Frank brings to vivid life the rich landscape and its unpretentious folks.... A reader need only close her eyes for a moment to feel that thick-sticky heat, smell the wild salt marshes.
Atlanta Journal-Consistution
Frank (Sullivan's Island) creates a world in which aspiring writer Beth Hayes, whose chirpy internal monologues and quiet uncertainties make her easily endearing, is as much a character as the house she lives in. After graduating from college in Boston, Beth returns to the South to spend a year house-sitting her family's home, Island Gamble, while her mother, Susan, visits Paris. Frank's portrayal of a large and complicated family is humorous and precise: there's Susan, adoring and kind; Aunt Maggie, a stickler for manners; twin aunts Sophie and Allison, who run an exercise-and-vitamin empire; and uncles Timmy and Henry, the latter of whom has ties to Beth's trust fund. Frank's lovable characters occasionally stymie her pace; there's almost no room left for Beth's friends or her love affairs with sleazy Max Mitchell and cherubic Woody Morrison, though these become important later on. Frank is frequently funny, and she weaves in a dark undercurrent that incites some surprising late-book developments. Tight storytelling, winsomely oddball characters and touches of Southern magic make this a winner.
Publishers Weekly
Discussion Questions
1. Sullivans Island and the Island Gamble are very special to Dorothea Benton Frank and her characters. What does the island and their beloved home mean to the Hamilton and Hayes families? What does it mean to Beth? Do you have a special place—or a special retreat—of your own? If not, what kind of "Island Gamble" would you want? What would you call it?
2. When she returns from college in Boston, Beth remarks on how Sullivans Island has changed. Has your own hometown changed? If so, how? How do you feel about those changes?
3. When she arrives on Sullivans Island, Beth has some interesting thoughts about the place. "In her heart she felt the island really belonged to her mother's generation and those before her." BY the novel's end, do you think Beth has made her own claim to the island? Why?
4. The Hamilton/Hayes are extraordinarily close. What benefits does such closeness offer? Can there be a downside to being so close? How does this closeness influence Beth as she grows into a woman? How does Beth see her family and her role in it? What factors influence her viewpoint? How does distance affect her perspective: both her own, going to college in Boston, and her mother Susan's when she goes to Paris?
5. Beth also muses about her family: "The last four years had prepared her to live her own life, independent of her tribe. Isn't that why she went to college a thousand miles away in the first place?" Is that the purpose of college? Is Beth more or less independent by the story's end?
6. Describe Beth's relationship with the women in her life: her mother, Susan, her aunts Maggie and Sophie, her friend Cecily, even her editor Barbara Farlie, their importance to her and how they shape her.
7. Determined to do her duty to the family, Beth's "intention was to avoid any and all controversy and every kind of chaos." Why does it seem that the best of intentions often go awry?
8. Beth was long wary of intimacy with men. "In her mind there was nothing more dangerous that what her mother called love." How does this mindset affect her when she meets Max Mitchell? Discuss Beth's affair with him. Why is she attracted to him?
9. What does Beth think about Woody Morrison? How do her relationships with Max and Woody contrast? What does each man offer her?
10. Beth and Susan both lost their fathers at a young age. How does this loss color different aspects of their lives?
11. Susan had always dreamed of living in Paris, but circumstances cut her stay short. Yet Susan isn't disappointed. Why? Is it always better to realize our dreams? Is there a benefit in leaving some unfilled?
12. Dorothea Benton Frank has a gift for bringing the wild beauty and magic of the Lowcountry to life. How do you picture the Lowcountry? Is it a place you'd like to visit? If you have been there, how do your impressions compare to those in the novel?
13. One of the charms of the Island Gamble is that it is haunted. Do you believe in ghosts? Have you had any interesting experiences with the supernatural?
14. The author touches on the subject of race with grace and compassion. As Beth enjoys her close friendship with Cecily she thinks of the strictures placed upon her mother and Cecily's grandmother, Livvie. How else have changing social mores freed us over the years?
15. Family, independence, love, marriage, race, heartbreak, acceptance, trust, and change, are all themes interwoven in the novel. Using examples from the book, explain the role of each and how they evolve in the story's arc.
(Questions issued by publisher.)
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The Wedding Girl
Madeleine Wickham (aka Sophie Kinsella), 2009
St. Martin's Press
336 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780312628208
Summary
At the age of eighteen, in that first golden Oxford summer, Milly was up for anything. Rupert and his American lover, Allan, were an important part of her new, exciting life, so when Rupert suggested to her that she and Allan should get married to keep Allan in the country, Milly didn’t hesitate.
Ten years later, Milly is a very different person and engaged to Simon—who is wealthy, serious, and believes her to be perfect. Milly’s secret history is locked away so securely she has almost persuaded herself that it doesn’t exist—until, only four days before her elaborate wedding. To have and to hold takes on a whole new meaning when one bride’s past catches up with her and bring the present crashing down.
With her trademark style of keen insight, and razor sharp wit, Madeleine Wickham introduces her fanatical fan-base, plus a host of new readers to a fresh and irresistible heroine in The Wedding Girl. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Aka—Sophia Kinsella
• Birth—December 12, 1969
• Where—London, England, UK
• Education—B.A., Oxford University, M.Mus., King's College,
London
• Currently—lives in London, England
When we first meet Becky Bloomwood in Sophie Kinsella's Confessions of a Shopaholic, she's a financial journalist in London who's quickly realizing that though she may be a writer for Successful Saving magazine, she could use help practicing what she preaches. She's helplessly driving herself into debt buying things she can't afford, at one point rationalizing that buying something 30 percent off is actually saving money.
Becky was a hit with readers and spawned a franchise for Kinsella. In subsequent books, readers have followed her through a temptingly whirlwind series of adventures, with her best friend, Suze, and Luke, the love of her life, often along for the ride.
The Shopaholic books are little tours of fabulousness, where objects are introduced not as incidental to the story but as key players. Becky may not attend to certain life details such as bills or space to store all of her purchases, but she knows how to pay proper homage to the details in a dress or a vintage cocktail table. When she packs for a trip, we get the list of what she's bringing. What's more, she rationalizes and justifies purchases before you can say, "Credit or cash?" (The answer for Becky, by the way, is usually credit.
Those who value integrity or depth in their fictional characters would be well advised to steer clear of Becky; but Shopaholic fans identify with her weaknesses, finding her more sympathetic than sinister. She can be maddening in her lack of discipline or self-reflectiveness, but Kinsella has taken a cue from Jane Austen's Emma by infusing her character with enough optimism, heart, and generous spirit to overcome her faults. Becky always reassuringly lands right-side-up, making these books a fun flight of fancy.
The author has interspersed her popular series with a handful of stand-alone confections featuring protagonists as charming and deliciously funny as the Shopaholic. Fortunately for her many fans, Sophie Kinsella has a seemingly inexhaustible supply of affection for her characters. May it fuel many books to come!
Extras
Excerpts from a 2004 Barnes & Noble interview:
• I am a serial house mover: I have moved house five times in the last eight years! But I'm hoping I might stay put in this latest one for a while.
• I've never written a children's book, but when people meet me for the first time and I say I write books, they invariably reply, 'Children's books?' Maybe it's something about my face. Or maybe they think I'm J. K. Rowling!
• If my writing comes to a halt, I head to the shops: I find them very inspirational. And if I get into real trouble with my plot, I go out for a pizza with my husband. We order a pitcher of Long Island Iced Tea and start talking—and basically keep drinking and talking till we've figured the glitch out. Never fails!
• Favorite leisure pursuits: a nice hot bath, watching The Simpsons, playing table tennis after dinner, shopping, playing the piano, sitting on the floor with my two small boys, and playing building blocks and Legos.
• Least favorite leisure pursuit: tidying away the building blocks and Legos.
• When asked what book most influenced her career as a writer, here is her answer:
My earliest, most impactful encounter with a book was when I was seven and awoke early on Christmas morning to find Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory in my stocking. I had never been so excited by the sight of a book—and have possibly never been since! I switched on the light and read the whole thing before the rest of my family even woke up. I think that's when my love affair with books began. (Bio and interview from Barnes & Noble.)
Book Reviews
The usually reliable Wickham ("Shopaholic" series author Sophie Kinsella's alter ego) falters with this overplotted and heavy-handed smorgasbord of weddings and family shenanigans. Upon meeting wedding photographer Alexander Gilbert, Milly Havill realizes that he had photographed her when she first married 10 years earlier. Since that wedding was done as a favor to help keep Allan Kepinski, the American half of a gay couple, in England, Milly never told anyone about it, including her now-fiancé, Simon Pinnacle. The thought of Alexander revealing her past sends Milly into a panic. But that's just the beginning: Simon is bent on bettering his multimillionaire father in business and in marriage; Milly's bitter father, James, seems to appreciate Milly's independent older sister, Isobel, more than Milly; Isobel gets pregnant and is certain the father would not want a baby; and Rupert, the other half of the couple Milly had helped out, is now a born-again Christian. Unfortunately, the characters' struggles with identity, abortion and homosexuality are filtered through strained prose and too-obvious setups. A lighter touch and a tighter story would have helped.
Publishers Weekly
What if a decision you made in your youth came back to haunt you on the eve of your wedding? Milly Havill was a free-spirited Oxford student when she consented to marry her American friend Allan so that he could stay in England with his boyfriend, Rupert. Soon after their staged wedding, Milly parted company with Allan and Rupert and then lost touch. Ten years later, Milly is engaged to marry Simon, son of a prominent English businessman, in a most elaborate affair. Suddenly, as details of her first marriage surface, conflicts arise between Milly and Simon, Simon and his estranged father, and Milly's parents. These conflicts feel real and poignant without ever tipping the scale toward melodrama. Verdict: Wickham (Sleeping Arrangements), the pen name of Sophie Kinsella ("Shopaholic" series), explores how each character views marriage and commitment to spouse and family in a way that is highly entertaining but never glosses over the real issues. This novel will please Kinsella fans but will also likely expand her audience to readers who enjoy thoughtful chick lit.
Anastasia Diamond-Ortiz - Library Journal
The hallmarks of Kinsella-Wickham's novels are charming, delightfully ditzy heroines who narrate their stories in the first person. Although Milly is cut from the same cloth, this is much more of an ensemble piece than the author's earlier books. Happily, all the characters are equally captivating, and readers will be eager to find out what's in store for them. —Kristine Huntley
Booklist
A young British woman's storybook wedding to a rich man's son is jeopardized by a long-buried secret. Milly Havill has much to be joyful for as she prepares to wed devoted beau Simon Pinnacle, and she's doing her best to suppress unease about her failure to mention the tiny fact that she's already married. As a freewheeling teen, Milly spent a summer in Oxford, where she befriended two beautiful boys, Rupert and his American lover Allan, and readily agreed to "marry" Allan so that he might remain in England. She lost touch with them soon after the all-too-legal nuptials, but figured no one would ever find out. Enter Alexander, a smarmy photographer hired by Milly's social-climbing mother Olivia to document the big day. As a scornful teenage boy, Alexander picked up Milly's wedding veil when it blew off outside the registry office, and unfortunately for her he never forgets a face. Furthermore, he has a photo of Milly with Husband No. 1 and seems inclined to show it around. His taunts spur Milly to track down Rupert and Allan; what she finds is not what she expected. Meanwhile, the rest of her family has their own problems to deal with. Milly's sensible, unmarried sister Isobel is pregnant and won't name the baby's father, while put-upon dad James contemplates leaving his wife after the ceremony. Simon resents his wealthy father Harry for trying to buy his love after abandoning him and his mother. Simon's unhappy childhood and issues with trust add further complications to Milly's lie, as the two eventually have to face facts about who they really are, and what they really want. Wickham/Kinsella (Sleeping Arrangements, 2008, etc.) shines again.
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)
Also consider these LitLovers talking points to help get a discussion started for The Wedding Girl:
1. What's the reason that Milly doesn't come clean regarding her marriage to Allan.
2. What beef does photographer Alexander have with...well, the world?
3. What beef does Simon have with his father? Is he right... wrong...time to grow up? How does his relationship with Dad drive his life?
4. When Milly finds Rupert, what's the surprise?
5. What trait does Milly's father find admirable in Isobel?
6. Despite all the entertaining shenanigans, the novel deals with the serious issue of commitment. How does each character understand...or eventually learn...about what it means to remain committed to someone?
7. Wickham structures her novel by using the different voices of various characters. Do you like her approach? Why might she have chosen the first-person over a third-person narrator? Which character—or whose dilemma—do you find most sympathetic or believable?
(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)
The Magician's Elephant
Kate DiCamillo (illus., Yoko Tanaka), 2009
Candlewick Press
208 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780763644109
Summary
What if? Why not? Could it be?
When a fortuneteller's tent appears in the market square of the city of Baltese, orphan Peter Augustus Duchene knows the questions that he needs to ask: Does his sister still live? And if so, how can he find her? The fortuneteller's mysterious answer (an elephant! An elephant will lead him there!) sets off a chain of events so remarkable, so impossible, that you will hardly dare to believe it’s true. With atmospheric illustrations by fine artist Yoko Tanaka, here is a dreamlike and captivating tale that could only be narrated by Newbery Medalist Kate DiCamillo.
In this timeless fable, she evokes the largest of themes—hope and belonging, desire and compassion—with the lightness of a magician’s touch. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—March 25, 1964
• Where—Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA
• Education—University of Florida, Gainesville
• Awards—McKnight Artist Fellowship for Writers; Newbery
Honors Award, Because of Winn-Dixie; Newbery Medal, The
Tale of Despereaux
• Currently—lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota
Kate DiCamillo was born in Philadelphia, moved to Florida's warmer climate when she was five years old, and landed in Minneapolis in her 20s.
While working at a children's bookstore, DiCamillo wrote her first novel, Because of Winn-Dixie (2000). It was inspired by one of the worst winters in Minnesota, when she became homesick for Florida after overhearing a little girl with a southern accent. One thing led to another, and soon DiCamillo had created the voice of Opal Buloni, a resilient ten-year-old girl who has just moved to a small town in Florida with her father. Opal's mother abandoned the family when she was three years old, and her father has a hard time explaining why.
Though her father is busy and she has no friends, Opal's life takes a turn for the better when she adopts a fun-loving stray dog, Winn-Dixie (named after the supermarket where she found him, out in the parking lot). With Winn-Dixie as her guide, Opal makes friends with the eccentric people of her new town and even convinces her father to talk about her mother. Through Opal, readers are given a gift: a funny and heartrending story of how one girl's spirit can change her life and others'. Critics loved the book as much as readers, and in 2001, Because of Winn-Dixie was named a Newbery Honor Book.
DiCamillo's second novel, The Tiger Rising (2001), also deals with the importance of friendships, families, and making changes. Twelve-year-old Rob Horton and his father are dealing with grief, anger, and isolation after moving to Lister, Florida, six months after Rob's mother succumbs to cancer. Rob's father has a job at a motel (where they both also live), but it barely pays the bills. Struggling through the loss of his mother, Rob stifles his many confusing emotions as he battles bullies at his new school, worries about a rash on his legs, and copes with living in poverty.
In many ways, The Tiger Rising is a darker, more challenging story than Because of Winn-Dixie, but there is a similar light of deliverance in this beautiful novel: the healing power of friendship. Two meetings change Rob's life. First, he encounters a caged lion in the woods. Shortly thereafter he meets Sistine, who has recently moved to Lister after her parents' divorce. Sistine and Rob are polar opposites—she stands up to the school bullies and lets out every bit of her anger at her parents' divorce and her relocation. Through Sistine, Rob recognizes himself in the caged lion, and the story of how the two children free the beast is one of the most engaging reads in contemporary young adult fiction. With the lion free, Rob is free to grieve the loss of his mother and move on with his bittersweet new life in Lister. A National Book Award finalist, The Tiger Rising is hard to put down as it overflows with raw, engaging emotion.
In 2003, DiCamillo's third novel, The Tale of Despereaux, was released to the delight of readers and critics alike. This odd but enthralling fairy tale also touches on some of the topics from her first two novels—parental abandonment and finding the courage to be yourself. The hero, Despereaux Tilling, is a mouse who has always been different from the rest of his family, and to make matters worse, he has broken a serious rule: interacting with humans, particularly Princess Pea, who captures his heart. When Despereaux finds himself in trouble with the mouse community, he is saddened to learn that his father will not defend him. Characters in the tale are Princess Pea, whose mother died after seeing a rat in her soup; King Pea, who, in his grief, declares that no soup may be served anywhere in the kingdom; Miggery Sow, a servant girl who dreams of being a princess after being sold into servitude by her father after her mother dies; and Roscuro, a villainous rat with a curious soup obsession.
The story of how the characters' paths cross makes The Tale of Despereaux an adventurous read, reminiscent of Grimm's fairy tales. In the spirit of love and forgiveness, Despereaux changes everyone's life, including his own. As the unnamed, witty narrator of the novel tells us, "Every action, reader, no matter how small, has a consequence." Kate DiCamillo's limitless imagination and her talent for emotional storytelling earned her one of the most prestigious honors a children's author can receive—in 2004, she was awarded the Newbery Medal.
Extras
From a 2004 Barnes & Noble interview:
• I wrote The Tale of Despereaux for a friend's son, who had asked me to write a story for him about a hero with large ears.
• I can't cook and I'm always on the lookout for a free meal.
• I love dogs and I'm an aunt to a very bad dog named Henry.
• My first job was at McDonald's. I was overjoyed when I got a nickel raise.
• I'm a pretty boring person. I like reading. I like eating dinner out with friends. I like walking Henry. And I like to laugh. (Author bio from Barnes & Noble.)
Book Reviews
Newbery Medalist Kate DiCamillo tells a timeless tale as "strange and lovely and promising" as her title character. The occasional illustrations, too, are dreamlike and magical. In delicate shades of gray, Yoko Tanaka's acrylics convey the city's low wintry light and the mood of a place haunted by a recent, unnamed war. With its rhythmic sentences and fairy-tale tone, this novel yields solitary pleasures but begs to be read aloud. Hearing it in a shared space can connect us, one to one, regardless of age, much like the book's closing image: a small stone carving, hands linked, of the elephant's friends.
Mary Quattlebaum - Washington Post
DiCamillo writes here in a register entirely her own, catching not the whimsical-fabulous note of earlier masters for young readers, nor the jokey-realistic one that has too often taken its place, but instead a mood of sober magic that unfolds into something that can be called, without pejorative, "sentimental," meaning straightforward and heartfelt. The style may evoke Calvino, but the substance belongs to Christmas…the magic of DiCamillo's stories is that while they have the dignity of literature, they're never unduly "literary." Young readers are caught up in the fable before they know they are being fabulized at, trapped in the poetry of the allegory without any idea that allegories are set as traps by authors.
Adam Gopnik - New York Times
In DiCamillo's fifth novel, a clairvoyant tells 10-year-old Peter, an orphan living with a brain-addled ex-soldier, that an elephant will lead him to his sister, who the ex-soldier claims died at birth. The fortuneteller's prediction seems cruelly preposterous as there are no pachyderms anywhere near Baltese, a vaguely eastern European city enduring a bitter winter. Then that night at the opera house, a magician “of advanced years and failing reputation” attempts to conjure a bouquet of lilies but instead produces an elephant that crashes through the ceiling. Peter learns that both magician and beast have been jailed, and upon first glimpse of the imprisoned elephant, Peter realizes that his fate and the elephant's are linked. The mannered prose and Tanaka's delicate, darkly hued paintings give the story a somber and old-fashioned feel. The absurdist elements—street vendors peddle chunks of the now-infamous opera house ceiling with the cry “Possess the plaster of disaster!”—leaven the overall seriousness, and there is a happy if predictable ending for the eccentric cast of anguished characters, each finding something to make them whole.
Publishers Weekly
On a perfectly ordinary day, Peter Augustus Duchene goes to the market square of the city of Baltese. Instead of buying the fish and bread that his guardian, Vilna Lutz, has asked him to procure, he uses the coin to pay a fortune-teller to get information about his sister, whom he believes to be dead. He is told that she is alive, and that an elephant will lead him to her. That very night at a performance in the town's opera house, a magician conjures up an elephant (by mistake) that crashes through the roof and cripples the society dame she happens to land on. The lives of the boy, his guardian, and the local policeman, along with the magician and his unfortunate victim, as well as a beggar, his dog, a sculptor, and a nun all intertwine in a series of events triggered by the appearance of the elephant. Miraculous events resolve not only the mystery of the whereabouts of Peter's sister, but also the deeper needs of all of the individuals involved. DiCamillo's carefully crafted prose creates an evocative aura of timelessness for a story that is, in fact, timeless. Tanaka's acrylic artwork is meticulous in detail and aptly matches the tone of the narrative. This is a book that demands to be read aloud.—Tim Wadham, St. Louis County Library, MO
School Library Journal
I intended only lilies. In a small 1890-something European village, an anonymous traveling magician changes lives forever when a simple trick goes tragically wrong. Instead of lovely flowers, a full-grown elephant falls through the ceiling of the theater, landing on a woman and crushing her legs. At almost the same moment, young Peter hears from a fortuneteller that Adele, the sister he had been told was dead is actually alive and that an elephant would reunite them. DiCamillo entrances her audience with a group of quaint characters to accompany Peter and Adele on their journey back to one another—a crippled carver of gargoyles, an embittered soldier, a childless policeman and his wife, and a noblewoman who insists on housing the elephant in her ballroom. Each plays a valuable role in the others' lives as individual answers to the question, "What if?" become clear. Tanaka's pencil illustrations in shades of gray portray the characters as stiff and angular, almost marionette-like in appearance, they but are an oddly agreeable match for the fantastical events. Thoughtful readers will feel a quiet satisfaction with this almost dainty tale of impossible happenings. —Pam Carlson
VOYA
Ten-year-old Peter Augustus Duchene goes to the market for fish and bread but spends it at the fortuneteller's tent instead. Seeking his long-lost sister, Peter is told, "You must follow the elephant. She will lead you there." And that very night at the Bliffenendorf Opera House, a magician's spell goes awry, conjuring an elephant that crashes through the ceiling and lands on Madam Bettine LaVaughn. Reading like a fable told long ago, with rich language that begs to be read aloud, this is a magical story about hope and love, loss and home, and of questioning the world versus accepting it as it is. Brilliant imagery juxtaposes "glowering and resentful" gargoyles and snow, stars and the glowing earth, and Tanaka's illustrations (not all seen) bring to life the city and characters from "the end of the century before last." A quieter volume than The Tale of Despereaux (2003) and The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane (2006), this has an equal power to haunt readers long past the final page.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. An author makes a very important choice with the first line of any story. This story begins: "At the end of the century before last, in the market square of the city of Baltese, there stood a boy..."
•Why do you think that Kate DiCamillo made this choice?
•How long ago is the story set?
2. Peter has been given money by Vilna Lutz to buy food, but he spends part of it on a fortuneteller instead. In "Jack and the Beanstalk," Jack makes a similar choice when he trades his cow for five magic beans instead of selling it. Can you think of any other stories that begin with an errand that is waylaid? What makes this an effective narrative device?
3. When he is standing in line in the market, Peter overhears the fishmonger say, "Well, he wasn't much of a magician, and none of them was expecting much, you see—that's the thing. Nothing was expected.... He hadn't promised them nothing special, and they wasn't expecting it neither" (page 19).
•Who is the fishmonger talking about?
•What happened that was out of the ordinary?
•How does the unexpected event change the attitude of the city (see pages 55 and 59)?
•Does it affect everyone in the same way?
•Can you think of an unexpected event in your own life that changed you? How?
4. In the middle of his usual trick to produce lilies, the magician adds the words of a different spell, even though he knows that "the words were powerful and also, given the circumstances, somewhat ill-advised. But he wanted to perform something spectacular" (pages 25–26).
•Why do you think he made this choice?
•Given what you know about what happened because of this choice, would you have done the same? Why?
5. After her injury, Madam LaVaughn visits the prison every day to speak to the magician. Every day they say the same things to each other: the magician says that he intended only to produce flowers, and she responds that he doesn't understand that she is crippled. Madam LaVaughn's manservant, Hans, finally says to them: "It is important that you say what you mean to say. Time is too short. You must speak words that matter" (page 49).
•What inspires him to say this?
•What does he mean?
6. When the elephant is on display, the entire city comes to see her. "And everyone, each person, had hopes and dreams, wishes for revenge, and desires for love. They stood together. They waited. And secretly, deep within their hearts, even though they knew it could not truly be so, they each expected that the mere sight of the elephant would somehow deliver them, would make their wishes and hopes and desires come true" (pages 113–114).
•Can you think of any people or events in contemporary society that have made people feel the same way?
•If the same thing were to happen tomorrow, do you think we would experience it differently? How?
7. After Peter sees the elephant in the ballroom, he promises to help her. But as he walks away, he feels that it was the worst kind of promise to make (page 130)Why? Have you ever done the same?
8. Faith and hope are central themes in this story. Peter believes that if he can find the elephant, he will find his sister. This faith overcomes even his doubt that he can keep his promise. As he asks the other characters to join him, they each believe because he asks them to. The elephant believes most of all: "In the ballroom of the countess Quintet, when the elephant opened her eyes and saw the boy standing before her, she was not at all surprised. She thought simply, You. Yes, you. I knew that you would come for me" (page 173).
•How would the story have unfolded if Peter had not believed?
•What other examples of faith do you find in the story?
9. When Peter eats Gloria's stew, he begins to cry. Why? Is it just because he has been so hungry, or is it something more (pages 136–137)?
10. When the magician goes to reverse his spell, he knows that "There is as much magic in making things disappear as there is in making them appear. More, perhaps. The undoing is almost always more difficult than the doing" (page 185).
•Have you ever had to undo something you wish you had never done?
•Do you agree with the statement?
11. After the elephant has disappeared, the narrator says, "And that, after all, is how it ended. Quietly. In a world muffled by the gentle, forgiving hand of snow" (page 193).
•What did you think of the book's ending?
•Do all the characters have happy endings?
•Do you believe each character is where he or she belongs by the end?
•If you were the author, would you change anything about the story's ending? Why?
(Questions issued by publisher.)