The Bookshop on the Corner
Jenny Colgan, 2016
HarperCollins
368 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780062467256
Summary
Nina Redmond is a librarian with a gift for finding the perfect book for her readers. But can she write her own happy-ever-after?
In this valentine to readers, librarians, and book-lovers the world over, the New York Times-bestselling author of Little Beach Street Bakery returns with a funny, moving new novel for fans of Meg Donohue, Sophie Kinsella, and Nina George’s The Little Paris Bookshop.
Nina Redmond is a literary matchmaker. Pairing a reader with that perfect book is her passion—and also her job.
Or at least it was. Until yesterday, she was a librarian in the hectic city. But now the job she loved is no more.
Determined to make a new life for herself, Nina moves to a sleepy village many miles away. There she buys a van and transforms it into a bookmobile—a mobile bookshop that she drives from neighborhood to neighborhood, changing one life after another with the power of storytelling.
From helping her grumpy landlord deliver a lamb, to sharing picnics with a charming train conductor who serenades her with poetry, Nina discovers there’s plenty of adventure, magic, and soul in a place that’s beginning to feel like home—a place where she just might be able to write her own happy ending. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—January 1, 1972
• Where—Prestwick, Ayrshire, Scotland, UK
• Education—University of Edinburgh
• Awards—Romantic Novelists' Association's Romantic Novel of the Year
• Currently—lives in France and London, England
Jenny Colgan is a British chick-lit writer of romantic comedies since 2000. She also used the pseudonym Jane Beaton and J. T. Colgan for other fiction. In 2013, her novel Welcome to Rosie Hopkin's Sweetshop of Dreams won the Romantic Novel of the Year Award by the .
In 2000, she published her first novel, iniating a string romantic comedies. Since then she has published more than 20: some series and others standalones. Her most recent is her 2016 novel, The Bookshop on the Corner.
Personal life
Jenny Colgan was born in 1972 in Prestwick, Ayrshire, Scotland, British. She studied at Edinburgh University. She worked for six years in the health service, moonlighting as a cartoonist and a stand-up comic.
She is married to Andrew, a marine engineer, and has had three children. She divides her time between France and London.
Novels
• Stand Alone
Amanda's Wedding (2000)
Looking for Andrew McCarthy (2001)
Talking to Addison (2001)
Working Wonders (2003) aka Arthur Project
Do You Remember the First Time? (2004) aka The Boy I Loved Before
Sixteen Again (2004)
Where Have All the Boys Gone? (2005)
West End Girls (2006)
Operation Sunshine (2007)
Diamonds Are A Girls Best Friend (2008)
The Good, the Bad and the Dumped (2010)
The Loveliest Chocolate Shop In Paris (2013)
The Little Beach Street Bakery (2014)
The Bookshop on the Corner (2016)
• Cupcake Cafe
Meet me at the Cupcake Cafe (2011)
Christmas at the Cupcake Cafe (2012)
• Rosie Hopkins' Sweet Shop
Welcome to Rosie Hopkins' Sweet Shop of Dreams (2012)
Christmas at Rosie Hopkins Sweet Shop (2013)
• As Jane Beaton
Maggie, a Teacher In Turmoil
Class (2008)
Rules (2010)
• J. T. Colgan
Doctor Who: Dark Horizons (2012)
(Author bio from Wikipedia. Retrieved 2/21/2014.)
Book Reviews
What’s a shy English librarian to do when she’s downsized out of a job?... With a keen eye for the cinematic, Colgan is a deft mistress of romantic comedy.... A charming, bracingly fresh happily-ever-after tale with playful nods to the Outlander series.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
We'll add publisher questions if and when they're available; in the meantime use these LitLovers talking points to start a discussion for The Bookshop on the Corner...then take off on your own:
1. Describe Nina: just how socially and/or professionally unprepared is she to face a world outside of a library? Would you consider her job—matching people to books, what's often referred to as a Readers Advisor—a dream job as Nina did?
2. Talk about the library's closing? Are library closings a growing trend, or will they be several years from now? What is happening in your own community; are funds being cut to libraries, hours shortened, books not bought, staff not hired? What does the future hold for libaries, and how are they coping with the digital age?
3. What are some of the struggles Nina undergoes to get her dream library off the ground? Talk about the decisions she has to make. Does the van seem like an overly risky venture for someone like Nina?
4. The book contains sly allusions to the Outlander series. Have you located any of the references? Why might the author have decided to include them?
5. Describe the village of Kirrinfief, including the characters who populate it. Whom did you find most intriguing? What was village life like without books? Imagine yourself living in Kirrinfief, or a place like it: how would you fare absent access to books?
6. Did you predict the ending?
(Questions by LitLovers Please feel free to use them, online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)
Lady Cop Makes Trouble (Kopp Sisters Series, 2)
Amy Stewart, 2016
Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
320 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780544409941
Summary
The best-selling author of Girl Waits with Gun returns with another adventure featuring the fascinating, feisty, and unforgettable Kopp sisters.
After besting (and arresting) a ruthless silk factory owner and his gang of thugs in Girl Waits with Gun, Constance Kopp became one of the nation’s first deputy sheriffs. She's proven that she can’t be deterred, evaded, or outrun.
But when the wiles of a German-speaking con man threaten her position and her hopes for this new life, and endanger the honorable Sheriff Heath, Constance may not be able to make things right.
Lady Cop Makes Trouble sets Constance loose on the streets of New York City and New Jersey—tracking down victims, trailing leads, and making friends with girl reporters and lawyers at a hotel for women. Cheering her on, and goading her, are her sisters Norma and Fleurette—that is, when they aren't training pigeons for the war effort or fanning dreams of a life on the stage.
Based on a true story, Girl Waits with Gun introduced Constance Kopp and her charming and steadfast sisters to an army of enthusiastic readers. Those readers will be thrilled by this second installment—also ripped from the headlines—in the romping, wildly readable life of a woman forging her own path, tackling crime and nefarious criminals along the way. (From the publisher.)
This is the second novel in the series. Girl Waits with Gun (2015) is the first.
Author Bio
• Born—ca. 1968-69
• Where—N/A
• Education—B.S., M.S., University of Texas-Austin
• Awards—(See below)
• Currently—lives in Eureka, California
Amy Stewart is the author of eight books. Her debut novel Girl Waits With Gun, based on a true story, was published to wide acclaim in 2015. Lady Cop Makes Trouble, the second in the Kopp Sisters series, came out in 2016, also to favorable reviews.
She has also written six nonfiction books on the perils and pleasures of the natural world, including four New York Times bestsellers: The Drunken Botanist (2013), Wicked Bugs (2011), Wicked Plants (2009), and Flower Confidential (2009).
She lives in Eureka, California, with her husband Scott Brown, who is a rare book dealer. They own a bookstore called Eureka Books. The store is housed in a classic nineteenth-century Victorian building that Amy very much hopes is haunted.
Media
Since her first book was published in 2001, Stewart has appeared on NPR’s Morning Edition and Fresh Air, she’s been profiled in the New York Times and San Francisco Chronicle, and she’s been featured on CBS Sunday Morning, Good Morning America, the PBS documentary The Botany of Desire, and—believe it or not—TLC’s Cake Boss.
Amy has written for the New York Times, Washington Post, and many other newspapers and magazines. She is the co-founder of the popular blog GardenRant.
Honors & Awards
Amy’s books have been translated into twelve languages, and two of them—Wicked Plants and Wicked Bugs—have been adapted into national traveling exhibits that appear at botanical gardens and museums nationwide.
She is the recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship, the American Horticulture Society’s Book Award, and an International Association of Culinary Professionals Food Writing Award. In 2012, she was invited to be the first Tin House Writer-in-Residence, a partnership with Portland State University, where she taught in the MFA program.
Lectures & Events
Amy travels the country as a highly sought-after public speaker whose spirited lectures have inspired and entertained audiences at college campuses such as Cornell and the University of Minnesota, corporate offices, including Google (where she served tequila and nearly broke the Internet), conferences and trade shows, botanical gardens, bookstores, and garden clubs nationwide. Go here to find out where she’s heading next. (Author bio from the author's website.)
Book Reviews
Oh, how Constance Kopp longs for the badge that tells the world she is indeed a deputy sheriff. But the powers-that-be are slow to approve her appointment. You see, in 1915, women cannot yet vote and most municipalities require that deputies be voters. So Constance is often stuck serving as a jail matron. Her immediate supervisor, affable Sheriff Heath, does allow her to be involved in some investigations ranging throughout Hackensack, New Jersey, and New York City. READ MORE.
Keddy Ann Outlaw - LitLovers
It’s "True Grit," New York style. Stewart delivers the second novel in her series based on the real-life antics of Constance Kopp, one of the few female deputy sheriffs who lived 100 years ago. With encouragement from her two sisters, Constance tracks a German con man through the streets of the Big Apple. The book’s title is inspired by several actual newspaper headlines of the time about the small number of women who worked in law enforcement.
New York Post
In this comic mystery set in 1915 and based on actual events, Constance Kopp, the first female deputy sheriff in Bergen County, N.J., is still packing a pistol and an attitude.... Stewart’s second volume...is a clever, suspenseful, and funny tale of a formidable woman facing crime, politics, social stigma, all while nailing evildoers..
Publishers Weekly
(Starred review.) Constance and her sisters are every bit as enjoyable in this outing as their first. Stewart deftly combines the rough-and-tumble atmosphere of early 20th-century New York City with the story of three women who want to live life on their own terms. [S]upporting female characters...[are] a welcome touch to the series. —Sarah Cohn, Manhattan Coll. Lib., Bronx, NY
Library Journal
[W]ry situational humor and...unique, forceful character. Stewart adeptly introduces details of early twentieth-century life in Hackensack, New Jersey, a burgeoning city on the outskirts of New York, and timely concerns such as jail reform and women’s rights, rounding out this immensely satisfying mystery.
Booklist
[P]lot details are less compelling than our rooting interest in Constance out-detecting all the men (which she does) and in the evocative period atmosphere... of early-20th-century New York City.... Smart, atmospheric fun, with enough loose ends left dangling to assure fans there will be more entries in this enjoyable series.
Kirkus Reviews
Constance is based on a real woman who, just prior to World War I, became a deputy sheriff in New Jersey, one of the first of her kind in the country. And yes, she does make trouble.... Stewart crafts a heady brew of mystery and action in a fast-moving, craftily written novel that’s fueled by actual news headlines of the day.
BookPage
Discussion Questions
1. "Improbable as it may sound, I had, at last, found work that suited me," Constance says of her job as deputy sheriff (page 4). Do you think Mrs. Headison, the first other woman law enforcement officer Constance meets, would express the same sentiment? Why or why not?
2. In addition to her deputy sheriff duties, Constance serves Paterson as the jail matron. How do the expectations and requirements of this aspect of her job compare to those of her work as a deputy? How does each position speak to Constance’s strengths and weaknesses?
3. In this sequel, we get to see how Constance embraces her new role as deputy sheriff. How have the other Kopp sisters—Fleurette and Norma—come into their own, or changed, due to their battle with Henry Kaufman and his Black Handers from Girl Waits with Gun?
4. As she stakes out the home of an escaped convict’s brother, hoping to spot her quarry, Constance observes, "The shops looked like set pieces in a theater, waiting silently behind the curtain for the lights to come up and the actors to step out in their costumes and take the parts of shopkeepers and pushcart drivers" (page 97). What part is Constance playing at this point in the novel? How does the way she sees herself differ from the ways other characters see her, such as Sheriff Heath, Mrs. Heath, Norma and Fleurette?
5. In Girl Waits with Gun, we explored the lives of women in this time period through the lens of the Kopp sisters’ experiences. In Lady Cop Makes Trouble, we again delve into the lives of women, but this time the experience is much broader, taking us out into the world as Constance herself broadens her horizons. In an era where women have limited options, discuss how characters like Providencia Monafo, Mrs. Heath, Aunt Adele, and Constance deal with fears and disappointments: How do they each choose to cope?
6. Constance reminisces on page 192 about how hard her mother tried to keep her from escaping her world of domestic duties and isolated farm life. Constance similarly wants to keep Fleurette from escaping to the city, the theater, and all she fears that entails. Discuss the ways in which worldviews change between generations—especially those experiencing the kind of social change we see happening in this novel—and how this influences your opinion of Constance and Fleurette’s relationship. Do you think Constance’s concerns are well founded? How do you imagine young women like Fleurette and her friend Helen see these concerns?
7. "Deputies follow the orders given to them by the sheriff," says Sheriff Heath (page 240). Those who don’t, he asserts, are called outlaws. It’s true that Constance hasn’t received her badge and is not legally a deputy in this novel. But do you think Constance is an outlaw according to this definition? What power do titles and labels really have—can one still embody a role without "officially" owning its label? What other labels and titles are examined and challenged in this novel?
8. Sheriff Heath goes to great pains to keep Constance’s name out of the papers and keep her from public shame over losing von Matthesius. Do you think it’s reckless of her to pursue the man despite the sheriff’s direct orders to the contrary? "You only take orders from yourself," Heath admonishes (page 235). What would you have done in her place? What other "rules" does Constance break (or bend) in her life?
9. When they catch Reinhold, the messenger boy, he exclaims morosely, "Rudy told me to watch for police, but he didn’t say nothing about a lady" (p234). Many characters focus on women not being able to do what a man can do, but what about the reverse? Identify the advantages, both illustrated in this novel and in general, of having a female law enforcement officer.
10. Much changes once Constance captures von Matthesius. Describe the changes between her and her family. What else shifts for Constance and those around her? How might things have ended if Constance had not caught von Matthesius? How would his escape influence how you viewed Constance’s actions throughout the novel?
11. "The first line came with such tenderness that it seemed as if it was meant for each one of us," Constance thinks of the Christmas carol lyrics shared in the novel’s ending (page 302). Discuss how they apply to Constance and her fellow lawmen. Why do you think the author chose to end the novel with this poignant moment?
(Questions issued by publisher.)
top of page (summary)
The City Baker's Guide to Country Living
Louise Miller, 2016
Penguin Publishing
352 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781101981207
Summary
A full-hearted novel about a big-city baker who discovers the true meaning of home—and that sometimes the best things are found when you didn’t even know you were looking
When Olivia Rawlings—pastry chef extraordinaire for an exclusive Boston dinner club—sets not just her flambeed dessert but the entire building alight, she escapes to the most comforting place she can think of—the idyllic town of Guthrie, Vermont, home of Bag Balm, the country’s longest-running contra dance, and her best friend Hannah.
But the getaway turns into something more lasting when Margaret Hurley, the cantankerous, sweater-set-wearing owner of the Sugar Maple Inn, offers Livvy a job. Broke and knowing that her days at the club are numbered, Livvy accepts.
Livvy moves with her larger-than-life, uberenthusiastic dog, Salty, into a sugarhouse on the inn’s property and begins creating her mouthwatering desserts for the residents of Guthrie. She soon uncovers the real reason she has been hired—to help Margaret reclaim the inn’s blue ribbon status at the annual county fair apple pie contest.
With the joys of a fragrant kitchen, the sound of banjos and fiddles being tuned in a barn, and the crisp scent of the orchard just outside the front door, Livvy soon finds herself immersed in small town life.
And when she meets Martin McCracken, the Guthrie native who has returned from Seattle to tend his ailing father, Livvy comes to understand that she may not be as alone in this world as she once thought.
But then another new arrival takes the community by surprise, and Livvy must decide whether to do what she does best and flee—or stay and finally discover what it means to belong. Olivia Rawlings may finally find out that the life you want may not be the one you expected—it could be even better. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—N/A
• Rasied—Boston, Massachusetts, USA
• Education—Maine College of Art
• Currently—lives in Boston, Massachusetts
Louise Miller is a writer and pastry chef who lives and works in Boston, Massachusetts.
Born to two Teamsters, she was raised in urban Boston until the age of eight, when she moved to a posh suburb and quickly learned that in order to survive she would have to lose her thick Boston accent. She still drops her r’s when tired or angry.
Louise attended Portland School of Art (now Maine College of Art) where she studied photography. She left art school when she ran out of money, and still dreams of going back someday. Louise started her first baking job in 1994, at a little bakery in Cambridge, MA. She hated her first job, gave notice and had vowed never to work in a kitchen again, when on her last day she met her baking mentor, who talked her into staying on by offering to teach her the art of pastry.
Louise has been a baker/pastry chef for over twenty years. She has worked in an exclusive golf club, the private kitchen of a major investment firm, a macrobiotic restaurant where she could only use maple syrup and barley malt as sweeteners, and a kosher gourmet shop. She is currently the pastry chef of The Union Club of Boston, a historic private club formed in 1863, where she has worked for the past thirteen years.
A lifelong lover of reading, Louise began her first attempt at novel writing in 2009. She received a scholarship in 2012 to attend GrubStreet’s Novel Incubator program, a year-long workshop for novelists, where she worked on the final revisions of her novel. The City Baker's Guide to Country Living was published in 2016.
Louise loves stories in all forms. In addition to books, she is a great lover of movies and an avid theatregoer. She and her partner hold subscriptions to two theatres in Boston, and they frequently travel to New York to see plays.
When she is not consuming stories in some form, Louise loves to be outside. She is a happy member of her community garden where, though as a lifelong vegetarian she eats a ton of vegetables, she is only interested in growing flowers.
Louise is also a mediocre old-time banjo player, and loves all animals, especially dogs. (From the author's website.)
Book Reviews
Sometimes novels about food, cooking and/or baking seem to me insubstantial, too full of pink frosting and improbable recipes. Not so with Louise Miller’s debut novel. This is heartier fare.... Livvy moves to Guthrie, Vermont, and takes a job at the Sugar Maple Inn. Here her life begins to shift towards deeper connections with the folks around her....[which] gave me many reasons to root for her, to hope against hope she would transform into a more fully realized human being.... All in all, a satisfying, dare I say—tasty read. READ MORE.
Keddy Ann Outlaw - LitLovers
[E]ndearing.... Miller, a pastry chef herself, writes about food with vivid detail...[and] excels at characterization.... Throughout, the novel’s empathetic spirit and unhurried pace allow it to grapple with grief, family, and belonging, while keeping the focus on Olivia’s difficult decisions.
Publishers Weekly
Mix in one part Diane Mott Davidson's delightful culinary adventures with several tablespoons of Jan Karon's country living and quirky characters, bake at 350 degrees for one rich and warm romance.... [A] lighthearted love story that's as homey as a slice of prized crumb apple pie. —Julia M. Reffner, North Chesterfield, VA
Library Journal
[Miller] initially succeeds in making these small-town concerns engaging with her witty writing. But...the book becomes treacly. A promising author who doesn't have the recipe quite right yet.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. Food and its role in tradition, community, and family is a theme that is threaded throughout the story. What are the culinary traditions in your family? Discuss how food can be an equalizer—among friends, enemies, strangers, etc.
2. Margaret and Dottie have been lifelong friends. How do you think their friendship evolved during that time? Have you had friendships that have spanned decades? How have they changed? How have they stayed the same?
3. At first, Livvy observes Guthrie from an outsider’s perspective, yet she soon warms to country life. Do you think Livvy does anything to hold her back from fully engaging in daily life in Guthrie? Have you ever had a limiting belief about yourself that has held you back from pursuing something you wanted?
4. Margaret and Livvy have a contentious relationship from the minute they meet. What is the turning point where they soften toward each other? Does it happen at the same time for both of them?
5. Food plays an integral part in the novel—New England treats such as sugar on snow and maple creemees are featured throughout. Is there a food or a food memory in your own life that you associate with a special place or time?
6. The City Baker’s Guide to Country Living is a story about belonging—to a person, to a place, to a community, to a family. What is it about Margaret, the McCrackens, and the community of Guthrie that makes Livvy feel like she has finally found home? What gives you a sense of belonging?
7. Fidelity is a running theme in the book. In the opening, Livvy is having an affair with a married man and alludes to other affairs. Why do you think Livvy engages in these kinds of relationships? How do they help or hurt her? How do they shape her experiences in Guthrie?
8. There are many unconventional families who appear in The City Baker—from Margaret’s relationship to the McCrackens to the staff at The Sugar Maple to Livvy’s relationship to Hannah to Livvy and Margaret’s relationship to each other. How do you define family? Do you have a chosen family as well as your birth family? Do you have people in your life whom you consider family who are not technically related to you?
(Questions issued by the publisher.)
A Great Reckoning (Inspector Gamach series, 12)
Louise Penny, 2016
St. Martin's Press
400 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781250022134
Summary
Louise Penny pulls back the layers to reveal a brilliant and emotionally powerful truth in her latest spellbinding novel.
When an intricate old map is found stuffed into the walls of the bistro in Three Pines, it at first seems no more than a curiosity. But the closer the villagers look, the stranger it becomes.
Given to Armand Gamache as a gift the first day of his new job, the map eventually leads him to shattering secrets. To an old friend and older adversary. It leads the former Chief of Homicide for the Surete du Québec to places even he is afraid to go. But must.
And there he finds four young cadets in the Surete academy, and a dead professor. And, with the body, a copy of the old, odd map.
Everywhere Gamache turns, he sees Amelia Choquet, one of the cadets. Tattooed and pierced. Guarded and angry. Amelia is more likely to be found on the other side of a police line-up. And yet she is in the academy. A protégée of the murdered professor.
The focus of the investigation soon turns to Gamache himself and his mysterious relationship with Amelia, and his possible involvement in the crime. The frantic search for answers takes the investigators back to Three Pines and a stained glass window with its own horrific secrets.
For both Amelia Choquet and Armand Gamache, the time has come for a great reckoning. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—1958
• Where—Toronto, Canada
• Education—B.A, Ryerson University
• Awards—Agatha Award (4 times) "New Blood" Dagger Award;
Arthur Ellis Award; Barry Award, Anthony Award; Dilys Award.
• Currently—lives in Knowlton, Canada (outside of Montreal)
In her words
I live outside a small village south of Montreal, quite close to the American border. I'd like to tell you a little bit about myself. I was born in Toronto in 1958 and became a journalist and radio host with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, specializing in hard news and current affairs. My first job was in Toronto and then moved to Thunder Bay at the far tip of Lake Superior, in Ontario. It was a great place to learn the art and craft of radio and interviewing, and listening. That was the key. A good interviewer rarely speaks, she listens. Closely and carefully. I think the same is true of writers.
From Thunder Bay I moved to Winnipeg to produce documentaries and host the CBC afternoon show. It was a hugely creative time with amazingly creative people. But I decided I needed to host a morning show, and so accepted a job in Quebec City. The advantage of a morning show is that it has the largest audience, the disadvantage is having to rise at 4am.
But Quebec City offered other advantages that far outweighed the ungodly hour. It's staggeringly beautiful and almost totally French and I wanted to learn. Within weeks I'd called Quebecers "good pumpkins", ordered flaming mice in a restaurant, for dessert naturally, and asked a taxi driver to "take me to the war, please." He turned around and asked "Which war exactly, Madame?" Fortunately elegant and venerable Quebec City has a very tolerant and gentle nature and simply smiled at me.
From there the job took me to Montreal, where I ended my career on CBC Radio's noon programme.
In my mid-thirties the most remarkable thing happened. I fell in love with Michael, the head of hematology at the Montreal Children's Hospital. He'd go on to hold the first named chair in pediatric hematology in Canada, something I take full credit for, out of his hearing.
It's an amazing and blessed thing to find love later in life. It was my first marriage and his second. He'd lost his first wife to cancer a few years earlier and that had just about killed him. Sad and grieving we met and began a gentle and tentative courtship, both of us slightly fearful, but overcome with the rightness of it. And overcome with gratitude that this should happen to us and deeply grateful to the family and friends who supported us.
Fifteen years later we live in an old United Empire Loyalist brick home in the country, surrounded by maple woods and mountains and smelly dogs.
Since I was a child I've dreamed of writing and now I am. Beyond my wildest dreams (and I can dream pretty wild) the Chief Inspector Gamache books have found a world-wide audience, won awards and ended up on bestseller lists including the New York Times. Even more satisfying, I have found a group of friends in the writing community. Other authors, booksellers, readers—who have become important parts of our lives. I thought writing might provide me with an income—I had no idea the real riches were more precious but less substantial. Friendships.
There are times when I'm in tears writing. Not because I'm so moved by my own writing, but out of gratitude that I get to do this. In my life as a journalist I covered deaths and accidents and horrible events, as well as the quieter disasters of despair and poverty. Now, every morning I go to my office, put the coffee on, fire up the computer and visit my imaginary friends, Gamache and Beauvoir and Clara and Peter. What a privilege it is to write. I hope you enjoy reading the books as much as I enjoy writing them.
Chief Inspector Gamache was inspired by a number of people, and one main inspiration was this man holding a copy of En plein coeur. Jean Gamache, a tailor in Granby. He looks slightly as I picture Gamache, but mostly it was his courtesy and dignity and kind eyes that really caught my imagination. What a pleasure to be able to give him a copy of En plein coeur! (From the author's website with permission.)
Book Reviews
Despite the theme of defiled innocence that makes this such a mournful story, the immense charm of the Gamache series survives in the magical setting and feisty residents of Three Pines…. Like most of the yarns we've heard about Three Pines, this one honors the town elders and respects the rituals of their quiet existence. But in a broader sense, the novel reaches beyond the living to become the saddest kind of ghost story, a lament for all "the phantom life that might have been."
Marilyn Stasio - New York Times Book Review
There’s a bit of Nancy Drew in Louise Penny’s masterful A Great Reckoning....but Penny, as ever, has something more ambitious in store.... As always in the Gamache series, the main narrative branches into more complicated patterns until all questions are resolved in a spectacular climax that cross cuts between story lines. The chief moral question that permeates the many subplots of A Great Reckoning is the vexing one of what elders owe to the young under their care.
Mureen Corrigan - Washington Post
(Starred review.) [L]yrical.... This complex novel deals with universal themes of compassion, weakness in the face of temptation, forgiveness, and the danger of falling into despair and cynicism over apparently insurmountable evils.
Publishers Weekly
(Starred review.) While this book may stand alone, fans of the series will enjoy revisiting old friends. Gamache remains admirable yet human.... This riveting read, with characters of incredible depth who only add to the strength of the plot, will keep readers guessing until the last page. —Terry Lucas, Shelter Island P.L., NY
Library Journal
(Starred review.) A compelling mystery and a rich human drama in which no character is either entirely good or evil, and each is capable of inspiring empathy.
Booklist
(Starred review.) Within a police force, some members must be trained in the science, and art, of solving murders. But does this training create people highly capable of committing them?.... A chilling story that's also filled with hope—a beloved Penny trademark.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
(We'll add specific questions if and when they're made available by the publisher. In the meantime, use our generic mystery questions.)
GENERIC DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
Mystery / Crime / Suspense Thrillers
1. Talk about the characters, both good and bad. Describe their personalities and motivations. Are they fully developed and emotionally complex? Or are they flat, one-dimensional heroes and villains?
2. What do you know...and when do you know it? At what point in the book do you begin to piece together what happened?
3. Good crime writers embed hidden clues in plain sight, slipping them in casually, almost in passing. Did you pick them out, or were you...clueless? Once you've finished the book, go back to locate the clues hidden in plain sight. How skillful was the author in burying them?
4. Good crime writers also tease us with red-herrings—false clues—to purposely lead readers astray? Does your author try to throw you off track? If so, were you tripped up?
5. Talk about the twists & turns—those surprising plot developments that throw everything you think you've figured out into disarray.
- Do they enhance the story, add complexity, and build suspense?
- Are they plausible or implausible?
- Do they feel forced and gratuitous—inserted merely to extend the story?
6. Does the author ratchet up the suspense? Did you find yourself anxious—quickly turning pages to learn what happened? A what point does the suspense start to build? Where does it climax...then perhaps start rising again?
7. A good ending is essential in any mystery or crime thriller: it should ease up on tension, answer questions, and tidy up loose ends. Does the ending accomplish those goals?
- Is the conclusion probable or believable?
- Is it organic, growing out of clues previously laid out by the author (see Question 3)?
- Or does the ending come out of the blue, feeling forced or tacked-on?
- Perhaps it's too predictable.
- Can you envision a different or better ending?
8. Are there certain passages in the book—ideas, descriptions, or dialogue—that you found interesting or revealing...or that somehow struck you? What lines, if any, made you stop and think?
9. Overall, does the book satisfy? Does it live up to the standards of a good crime story or suspense thriller? Why or why not?
(Generic Mystery Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)
top of page (summary)
Mercury
Margot Livesey, 2016
HarperCollins
336 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780062437501
Summary
Donald believes he knows all there is to know about seeing. An optometrist in suburban Boston, he is sure that he and his wife, Viv, who runs the local stables, are both devoted to their two children and to each other.
Then Mercury—a gorgeous young thoroughbred with a murky past—arrives at Windy Hill and everything changes.
Mercury’s owner, Hilary, is a newcomer to town who has enrolled her daughter in riding lessons. When she brings Mercury to board at Windy Hill, everyone is struck by his beauty and prowess, particularly Viv.
As she rides him, Viv begins to dream of competing again, embracing the ambitions that she had harbored, and relinquished, as a young woman. Her daydreams soon morph into consuming desire, and her infatuation with the thoroughbred escalates to obsession.
Donald may have 20/20 vision but he is slow to notice how profoundly Viv has changed and how these changes threaten their quiet, secure world. By the time he does, it is too late to stop the catastrophic collision of Viv’s ambitions and his own myopia.
At once a tense psychological drama and a taut emotional thriller exploring love, obsession, and the deceits that pull a family apart, Mercury is a riveting tour de force that showcases this "searingly intelligent writer at the height of her powers." (Jennifer Egan). (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—July 24, 1953
• Where—Perth, Scotland, UK
• Education—B.A., University of York, England
• Awards—L.L. Winship/PEN New England Award
• Currently—Boston, Massachusetts, USA
Margot Livesey is a Scottish born writer. She is the author of eight novels, numerous short stories, and essays on the craft of writing fiction.
Livesey came to North America during the 1970s where she worked to get her fiction published, reportedly because her boyfriend at the time was also a writer.
Her work has appeared in The New Yorker, Atlantic Monthly, and a number of literary quarterlies. She is also the Fiction Editor at Ploughshares, a renowned literary journal. Livesey served as a judge for the PEN/Bellwether Prize for Socially Engaged Fiction in 2012.
She currently lives in the Boston area and is the writer-in-residence at Emerson College and at the Iowa Writers' Workshop. She has formally served as a professor at Boston University, Bowdoin College, Tufts University, Carnegie Mellon University, Brandeis University, Cleveland State University, Williams College, and at the University of California, Irvine. (From Wikipedia. Retrieved 9/16/2016.)
When asked by Barnes and Noble editors in 2004, what book influenced her the most, Livesey had this to say:
This sounds self-centered but the book that had the biggest impact on me as a writer was the novel I wrote when I was twenty-two and traveling around Europe and North Africa. When I reread it at the end of the year I was amazed at how completely I had failed to be influenced by the many wonderful books I'd read. My characters were unbelievable, their conversations preposterous, the plot simultaneously dull and far-fetched, etc., etc. Seeing the enormous gap between the books I loved and my own was what made me want to be a writer in a serious way.
Book Reviews
[F]iercely intelligent.... [T]he novel unfolds patiently, through a chain of small and mostly well-intentioned deceptions that nevertheless yield catastrophe. [R]ich imagery that interweaves seamlessly with its textured evocation of everyday life.
Publishers Weekly
A prolific author and esteemed professor at the Iowa Writers' Workshop, Livesey has written a tangled morality tale not about a horse but about a marriage and friendships disintegrating under the steady drip of secrets and half-truths. There's plenty for discussion here. —Sally Bissell, formerly with Lee Cty. Lib. Syst., Fort Myers, FL
Library Journal
Livesey’s story of loyalty, deceit, ambition, and moral ambiguity is a read-in-one-sitting, sublimely nuanced psychological exploration of personal ethics and responsibility ideal for book-discussion groups. —Carol Haggas
Booklist
(Starred review.) Another probing study of the way character shapes our destinies from [Margot Livesey].... A sharply sketched supporting cast adds to the depth and cumulative power of this grimly great novel. Uncharacteristically dark, yet more evidence of Livesey's formidable gifts.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
We'll add publisher questions if and when they're available; in the meantime, use these LitLovers talking points to start a discussion for Mercury...then take off on your own:
1. What is the state of Donald and Viv's marriage when we first meet them? What are the fault lines in their relationship that you begin to detect early on? What are they like as individual characters—how would you describe each of them?
2. (Follow-up to Question 1): When Donald first moved the the U.S. as a boy, he wrote for years to his best friend, only to stop when he had to admit he wasn't coming back. What does this say about him? Talk about other ways that Donald, even as an adult, confronts painful emotions.
3. (Follow up to Question 1): Talk about Viv and her attachment to Mercury. How might the death of Viv's previous horse have heightened her passion for the new horse? What affect does her obsession with riding Mercury to victory? Is she delusional?
4. At what point in the plot did you begin to sense impending danger? When do events become foreboding?
5. Donald is the primary narrator of the novel. Why might Livesey have chosen to tell the story through his eyes? And speaking of eyes, what is the irony of the fact that Donald is an optometrist?
6. Talk about Mercury as a literary symbol? Think about Mercury as a Greek deity, a chemical element, and a planet. How do all those symbolic references come into play in this novel?
7. What does this story reveal about the way in which personal character can shape destiny?
(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, on online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)