Harry's Trees
Jon Cohen, 2018
MIRA
432 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780778364153
Summary
When you climb a tree, the first thing you do is to hold on tight…
Thirty-four-year-old Harry Crane works as an analyst for the US Forest Service. When his wife dies suddenly, he is unable to cope.
Leaving his job and his old life behind, Harry makes his way to the remote woods of northeastern Pennsylvania’s Endless Mountains, determined to lose himself.
But fate intervenes in the form of a fiercely determined young girl named Oriana. She and her mother, Amanda, are struggling to pick up the pieces from their own tragedy—Amanda stoically holding it together while Oriana roams the forest searching for answers.
And in Oriana’s magical, willful mind, she believes that Harry is the key to righting her world.
Now it’s time for Harry to let go…
After taking up residence in the woods behind Amanda’s house, Harry reluctantly agrees to help Oriana in a ludicrous scheme to escape his tragic past.
In so doing, the unlikeliest of elements—a wolf, a stash of gold coins, a fairy tale called The Grum’s Ledger and a wise old librarian named Olive—come together to create a golden adventure that will fulfill Oriana’s wildest dreams and open Harry’s heart to a whole new life.
Harry’s Trees is an uplifting story about the redeeming power of friendship and love and the magic to be found in life’s most surprising adventures. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—1958
• Where—Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, USA
• Education—B.A., Connecticut College; R.N. (nursing)
• Awards—Saturn Award for Best Writing (screenwriting)
• Currently—lives outside Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Jon Cohen is an American novelist and screenwriter. He is the author of several novels, most recently, Harry's Trees (2018). As a screenwriter he is best known for co-writing the 2002 film Minority Report.
A native of Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, Cohen was the son of a librarian and a English professor. After earning a B.A. in English, he switched tracks and got a second degree as a Registered Nurse, after which he worked for 10 years as a critical care nurse in Philadelphia.
During his time in nursing, Cohen began to write stories and, in 1991, published his first novel, Max Lakeman and the Beautiful Stranger. That same year Cohen also received a creative writing grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. The following year, 1992, Cohen's second book, The Man in the Window, came out (the novel was reissued in 2013 by Nancy Pearl's Book Lust Rediscoveries), and a third, Dentist Man, came out in 1993.
Then Cohen made another change: he decided to teach himself screenwriting—a decision that eventually led to working on the script for Steven Spielberg's Minority Report. That screenplay won him the 2002 Saturn Award for Best Writing (he shared the award with co-writer Scott Frank).
In 2018, Cohen published his fourth novel, Harry's Trees, in 2018. (Adapted from Wikipedia and BookPage. Retrieved 9/5/2018.)
Book Reviews
[W]insome but overstuffed novel…. Cohen tries to do too much in an otherwise straightforward narrative. Appalachian decline, the role of books in society, health care dysfunction, and dendrology are all packed into the novel…. The result is a story that never truly gets beneath the surface.
Publishers Weekly
[Starred review] Part fairy tale and… heartbreakingly realistic, Cohen's third novel will entrance readers from page one, and by the end, even skeptics will agree that magic can still be found in the most unlikely places and in the most surprising people if only we're willing to look.
Library Journal
[Starred review] When a young girl asks you to believe in fairy tales, sometimes you just have to obey. In Cohen's capable hands, the unlikely teamwork between an optimistic child and a wary adult makes for a tender tale of first loves and second chances.
Booklist
[T]his redemptive tale will speak to the hearts of those who've lost a loved one… and the many ways to heal; about redemption; about forgiveness; about letting go; but most of all, about the power of the human spirit to soar above tragedy and reunite with joy.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
We'll add publisher questions if and when they're available; in the meantime, use our LitLovers talking points to help start a discussion for HARRY'S TREES … then take off on your own:
1. How would you describe Harry—what kind of man is he? To what extent is his guilt over Beth's accident self-imposed: is his self-blame senseless or understandable? What is the irony of Harry's work as an analyst given his love of trees?
2. Talk about the way Harry's life has been shaped by his childhood. How would you describe that childhood—his parents, brother, and general upbringing? For young Harry, what do trees come to represent?
3. Harry's Trees is based on the belief that "the ordinary world is extraordinary, all the time, for everyone." What is meant by the "ordinary" world, and does that world have special meaning for you?
4. According to Harry, "Everybody's got a special tree, whether currently as an adult, or a tree from childhood." What is it about humans and our love for trees? What about you: have you ever had a special tree?
5. In a BookPage interview, Cohen has said, "I truly believe that when you are in love or when you grieve, you cross a line and see the world in an altered way.” Do you agree with Cohen? How does Cohen's observation play out in his novel? Have you ever had the kind of experience that has altered your perception of the world?
6. Talk about Amanda and, especially, Oriana. What does Oriana's world look like as she wanders the woods after her father's death? Would you consider her mature or immature for a 10-year old?
7. This novel is very much about the power of books in our lives. How does the author portray their significance?
8. What draws Harry and Oriana together. How are their two minds or souls matched? Oriana sees Harry's appearance in her life as a sign. A sign of what? Equally importantly, what does Harry see in Oriana?
9. What creates the magical feel to this otherwise realistic novel? The book asks the question, where does reality end and magic take over? Where do you think the lines are drawn…in the book and /or in real life? What roles do chance or luck play in our lives.
10. Other than the lottery (duh), how are the characters transformed by the end of the novel? Are they?
(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online and off, with attribution. Thanks.)
City of Girls
Elizabeth Gilbert, 2019
Penguin Publishing
480 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781594634734
Summary
"Life is both fleeting and dangerous, and there is no point in denying yourself pleasure, or being anything other than what you are."
Beloved author Elizabeth Gilbert returns to fiction with a unique love story set in the New York City theater world during the 1940s. Told from the perspective of an older woman as she looks back on her youth with both pleasure and regret (but mostly pleasure), City of Girls explores themes of female sexuality and promiscuity, as well as the idiosyncrasies of true love.
In 1940, nineteen-year-old Vivian Morris has just been kicked out of Vassar College, owing to her lackluster freshman-year performance. Her affluent parents send her to Manhattan to live with her Aunt Peg, who owns a flamboyant, crumbling midtown theater called the Lily Playhouse.
There Vivian is introduced to an entire cosmos of unconventional and charismatic characters, from the fun-chasing showgirls to a sexy male actor, a grand-dame actress, a lady-killer writer, and no-nonsense stage manager.
But when Vivian makes a personal mistake that results in professional scandal, it turns her new world upside down in ways that it will take her years to fully understand. Ultimately, though, it leads her to a new understanding of the kind of life she craves—and the kind of freedom it takes to pursue it.
It will also lead to the love of her life, a love that stands out from all the rest.
Now eighty-nine years old and telling her story at last, Vivian recalls how the events of those years altered the course of her life—and the gusto and autonomy with which she approached it. "At some point in a woman's life, she just gets tired of being ashamed all the time," she muses. "After that, she is free to become whoever she truly is."
Written with a powerful wisdom about human desire and connection, City of Girls is a love story like no other. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—July 18, 1969
• Raised—Litchfield, Connecticut, USA
• Education—B.A., New York University
• Awards—Pushcart Prize
• Currently—Frenchtown, New Jersey
Elizabeth M. Gilbert is an American author, essayist, short story writer, biographer, novelist and memoirist. She is best known for her 2006 memoir, Eat, Pray, Love, which spent 200 weeks on the New York Times Best Seller list, and was also made into a film by the same name in 2010.
Gilbert was born in Waterbury, Connecticut. Her father was a chemical engineer, her mother a nurse. Along with her only sister, novelist Catherine Gilbert Murdock, Gilbert grew up on a small family Christmas tree farm in Litchfield, Connecticut. The family lived in the country with no neighbors, and they didn’t own a TV or even a record player. Consequently, they all read a great deal, and Gilbert and her sister entertained themselves by writing little books and plays.
Gilbert earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science from New York University in 1991, after which she worked as a cook, a waitress, and a magazine employee. She wrote of her experience as a cook on a dude ranch in short stories, and also briefly in her book The Last American Man (2002).
Journalism
Esquire published Gilbert's short story "Pilgrims" in 1993, under the headline, "The Debut of an American Writer." She was the first unpublished short story writer to debut in Esquire since Norman Mailer. This led to steady—and well paying—work as a journalist for a variety of national magazines, including SPIN, GQ, New York Times Magazine, Allure, Real Simple, and Travel + Leisure.
Her 1997 GQ article, "The Muse of the Coyote Ugly Saloon", a memoir of Gilbert's time as a bartender at the very first Coyote Ugly table dancing bar located in the East Village section of New York City, was the basis for the feature film Coyote Ugly (2000). She adapted her 1998 GQ article, "The Last American Man: Eustace Conway is Not Like Any Man You've Ever Met," into a biography of the modern naturalist, The Last American Man, which received a nomination for the National Book Award in non-fiction. "The Ghost," a profile of Hank Williams III published by GQ in 2000, was included in Best American Magazine Writing 2001.
Early books
Gilbert's first book Pilgrims (1997), a collection of short stories, received the Pushcart Prize and was a finalist for the PEN/Hemingway Award. This was followed by her novel Stern Men (2000), selected as a New York Times "Notable Book." In 2002 she published The Last American Man (2002), a biography of Eustace Conway, a modern woodsman and naturalist, which was nominated for National Book Award.
Eat, Pray, Love
In 2006, Gilbert published Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia (Viking), a chronicle of her year of "spiritual and personal exploration" spent traveling abroad. She financed her world travel for the book with a $200,000 publisher's advance.
The memoir was on the New York Times Best Seller List of non-fiction in the spring of 2006, and in October 2008, after 88 weeks, the book was still on the list at number 2. Gilbert appeared on The Oprah Winfrey Show in 2007, and has reappeared on the show to further discuss the book and her philosophy, and to discuss the film. She was named by Time as among the 100 most influential people in the world. The film version was released in 2010 with Julia Roberts starring as Gilbert.
After EPL
Gilbert's fifth book, Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace with Marriage, was released in 2010. The book is somewhat of a sequel to Eat, Pray, Love in that it takes up Gilbert's life story where her bestseller left off. Committed also reveals Gilbert's decision to marry Felipe, the Brazilian man she met in Indonesia as recounted in the final section of EPL. The book is an examination of the institution of marriage from several historical and modern perspectives—including those of people, particularly women, reluctant to marry. In the book, Gilbert also includes perspectives on same-sex marriage and compares this to interracial marriage prior to the 1970s. Gilbert and Felipe are still married and operate a story called Two Buttons.
In 2012, she republished At Home on the Range, a 1947 cookbook written by her great-grandmother, the food columnist Margaret Yardley Potter. Apply
Gilbert returned to fiction in 2013 with The Signature of All Things, a sprawling 19th-century style novel following the life of a young female botonist. The book brings together that century's fascination with botany, botanical drawing, spiritual inquiry, exploration, and evolution. Kirkus Reviews called it "a brilliant exercise of intellect and imagination," and Booklist a "must read."
Literary influences
In an interview, Gilbert mentioned The Wizard of Oz with nostalgia, adding, "I am a writer today because I learned to love reading as a child—and mostly on account of the Oz books..." She is especially vocal about the importance of Charles Dickens to her, mentioning his stylistic influence on her writing in many interviews. She lists Marcus Aurelius' Meditations as her favorite book on philosophy. (Adapted from Wikipedia. Retrieved 9/16/2013.)
Book Reviews
[The] open-endedness, [the] refusal of received literary templates, is what makes City of Girls worth reading. It's not a simple-minded polemic about sexual freedom and not an operatic downer; rather, it's the story of a conflicted, solitary woman who's made an independent life as best she can. If the usual narrative shapes don't fit her experience—and they don't fit most lives—neither she nor her creator seems to be worrying about it.
David Gates - New York Times Book Review
Unfortunately, what should have been a mere 300-page novel became a 470-page tome. The best and worst thing that can be said about City of Girls is that it’s perfectly pleasant.… [I]t demands only stamina from its readers. Not that it’s without charm.… [Gilbert's] got a good ear for the arch repartee of 1940s comedy.… Novels so rarely get better [so] I was shocked to discover that the ending of City of Girls is genuinely moving.… [I]t’s a delight to see Gilbert finally invest these characters with some real emotional heft and complexity.
Ron Charles- Washington Post
[A] sometimes maddening, something frothy, and ultimately a punch-to-the-heart reminiscence.… [I]t’s hard to avoid growing impatient… [feeling] as though the best part of the story is waiting in the wings.… But the wait is not without its delights.… [T]he whole tone and texture of the novel dramatically change, becoming a more moving, haunting, and absolutely profound meditation on love, loss, friendship, and all the extraordinary ways people manage to live their lives.… [D]eliciously refreshing as a fizzy summer drink, but truly, in its second half, it’s also more like fine wine, thoughtfully crafted to be savored for its benefits.
Boston Globe
In other hands, this novel could have had all the adventure and enjoyment, but none of the depth; instead [Gilbert] makes it into a glorious, multilayered, emotionally astute celebration of womanhood. It would be easy to dismiss City of Girls as joyous escapism, and God knows there’s little enough of that around right now. But look more closely and what you’ll see is an eloquently persuasive treatise on the judgment and punishment of women, and a heartfelt call to reclaim female sexual agency.
Guardian (UK)
Gilbert spares her heroine anything resembling trauma.… I won’t spoil the dramatic fulcrum of the plot. But I will say that… some of the most dramatic moments in the novel may feel overly mechanistic. Is Vivian’s faux pas fully motivated? Likewise, is the pathos of the late-in-life love relationship convincing, or does it feel more like an idea grafted into the story to prove the Gilbert ethos that love is good even when unconventional? Still,… lush prose and firm belief in love… suffuses City of Girls.
San Francisco Chronicle
[A]n uneven yet decadently told tale about being a woman in a time when there was only one acceptable way to behave.… [T]he narration falters… [a]s the novel speeds up, allowing years of Vivian’s life to flash by, [and] the story-telling can’t keep up with the emotional weight it’s meant to carry. By fleshing out the journey of Vivian’s life, Gilbert distracts from the strength of the coming-of-age story and the descriptive power of her prose when she lingers on a moment.
Time
City of Girls, Gilbert's latest novel, has the faint whiff of the expected.… Still, Gilbert pulls off a breezy, entertaining read—and really, something better: a lively, effervescent, and sexy portrait of a woman living in a golden time. We just have to get past the somewhat ponderous, overly familiar framing device.… Passion, Gilbert never tires of informing us, that's the stuff of life.
Jean Zimmerman - NPR
[T]he glamorous greasepainted swirl of 1940s New York’s theater-world bohemia.… Girls takes a few darker turns as [the protagonist] stumbles toward adulthood, though Gilbert stays true to her pledge that she won’t let her protagonist’s sexuality be her downfall, like so many literary heroines before her. That may be the most radical thing about a novel that otherwise revels in the old-fashioned pleasures of storytelling—the right to fall down rabbit holes, and still find your own wonderland.
Entertainment Weekly
City of Girls is a testament to Gilbert's restless curiosity. She spent years researching the artistic scene of the city in the 1940s.… Their effect on the book is clear.… For anyone familiar with the lightness and the buoyancy of Gilbert’s own voice, the clunkiness of the period vernacular becomes a barrier to investing in the community at the heart of the novel.… Because Gilbert has a bewitching voice that comes through even when she is trying to mask it, though, City of Girls remains a vibrant novel about a woman balancing her desires with the age in which she lives.
Vanity Fair
(Starred review) [A] beguiling tale.… Vivian—originally reckless and selfish, eventually thoughtful and humane—is the perfect protagonist for this novel, a page-turner with heart complete with a potent message of fulfillment and happiness.
Publishers Weekly
The first half of Gilbert's historical novel is a rollicking coming-of-age delight, vividly capturing the spirit of the era. But the melancholy second half feels flat, owing to the awkward narrative structure that has.… Vivian reflecting on her life in a letter. —Wilda Williams, New York
Library Journal
(Starred review) Reading City of Girls is pure bliss, thanks to its spirited characters, crackling dialogue, rollicking yet affecting story lines, genuinely erotic scenes, and sexual intelligence, suspense, and incisive truths
Booklist
(Starred review) Vivian Morris.… [is a] delightful narrator.… Whatever Eat Pray Love did or did not do for you, please don't miss out on her wonderful novels any longer. A big old banana split of a book, surely the cure for what ails you.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. Narrative: Elizabeth Gilbert chooses to tell Vivian’s story in the form of a letter to a younger woman, Angela. How do you think the story benefits from being told in the voice of 89-year-old Vivian, looking back? What did you learn from this vantage? How did it influence your reading experience?
2. Character perspective: In 1940, nineteen-year-old Vivian’s introduction to life in New York City and within the Lily Playhouse is a shock after her world at Vassar and her family outside of the city. What is so different about it all? What elements of this new city and world shape her the most, do you think? And how might they have struck her differently if she’d come from a different kind of family and class background?
3. Sexuality: Vivian receives an atypical sexual education from her new friends, the showgirls, and from her time with Anthony. How does her time at the Lily shape Vivian’s ideas about sex and love and desire and appetite as a young woman, and how do these ideas sustain and evolve later in her life? How much do you think her adult ideas about female desire are due to her personality or experience? How typical do you think Vivian’s attitudes about sex and love would have been for someone of her age and time?
4. Female friendship, part 1: Consider the portrayal of Vivian’s friendship with Celia Ray, the smoldering showgirl at the Lily Playhouse. How does it compare to her previous experiences of female friendship from school. How much does this friendship influence what happens next for Vivian? Which of these two women, Vivian or Celia, do you think holds the power in their friendship, and why? How do you imagine their friendship would have played out over the years if certain events had not intervened?
5. Female friendship, part 2: How does Vivian’s later friendship with Marjorie compare with her younger friendship with Celia Ray? Would Vivian’s life with Marjorie and her other friends later in life have been possible if not for knowing Celia and the other women at the Lily when she was younger? Do you see her applying any lessons learned by observing the relationship between Peg and Olive and Uncle Billy?
6. Men: Consider the different male characters in the book—Vivian’s father, Walter, Uncle Billy, Mr. Herbert, Arthur, Anthony, Jim, Frank—and their different ideas expectations of women. What accounts for the differences between these men and how they relate to women? In what ways does Vivian meet their expectations or challenge / change them?
7. Fashion: City of Girls is full of descriptions of fantastic costumes and characters with truly original senses of style. What does Vivian learn about fashion and style from the showgirls? From her grandmother? From Edna? Even from Peg and Olive? Consider the role that fashion plays in Vivian’s story and in the various relationships and stages of her life: in boarding school, at the Lily Playhouse, at the Navy Yards, at L’Atelier with Marjorie, and in meeting Angela.
8. Generations: Edna, Olive, and Peg represent an older generation of women. Their views and relationships (with Billy, with Arthur) and behaviors influence Vivian in different ways. Consider what Vivian learns from Peg, Olive, and Billy’s domestic / professional arrangement. What about the dynamics she observes between Edna and Arthur? Think about how Edna treats Vivian after Vivian’s betrayal is revealed. Do you think Edna is justified in her behavior? Ultimately Edna decides to stay with Arthur even after what he has done. Do you think Vivian would have stayed with Arthur if she were in Edna’s position? Would Arthur have stayed with Edna if the positions were reversed?
9. Family: Were you surprised by the kind of life that Vivian builds with Marjorie and Nathan? In what ways can you see it growing out of her experiences at the Lily Playhouse in her twenties, and the lifestyle and values she adopts during and after the war? How does Vivian’s adult family life compare to the family she grew up with? Do you think Vivian ever wants more than the life she attains?
10. Love: What kind of love does Vivian have for Frank, and how does this love change the course of her life? How does Vivian’s love for Frank differ from her youthful love of Anthony? How does it compare with any of her other friendships or romantic relationships? How do you think Vivian would describe the difference between a "love" and a "lover"? Can you imagine Frank and Vivian having a physical relationship? How might that have changed Vivian’s life and story?
11. Values: On page 377, Vivian states: "I could have spent the rest of my life trying to prove that I was a good girl—but that would have been unfaithful to who I really was. I believed that I was a good person, if not a good girl." What does this quote mean to you? Is there a difference between being a good girl and being a good person? Does Vivian live up to this ideal in your opinion?
(Questions issued by the publisher.)
Elizabeth Is Missing
Emma Healey, 2014
HarperCollins
320 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780062309686
Summary
Winner, 2014 Costa First Novel Award
In this darkly riveting debut novel—a sophisticated psychological mystery that is also an heartbreakingly honest meditation on memory, identity, and aging—an elderly woman descending into dementia embarks on a desperate quest to find the best friend she believes has disappeared, and her search for the truth will go back decades and have shattering consequences.
Maud, an aging grandmother, is slowly losing her memory—and her grip on everyday life. Yet she refuses to forget her best friend Elizabeth, whom she is convinced is missing and in terrible danger.
But no one will listen to Maud—not her frustrated daughter, Helen, not her caretakers, not the police, and especially not Elizabeth’s mercurial son, Peter. Armed with handwritten notes she leaves for herself and an overwhelming feeling that Elizabeth needs her help, Maud resolves to discover the truth and save her beloved friend.
This singular obsession forms a cornerstone of Maud’s rapidly dissolving present. But the clues she discovers seem only to lead her deeper into her past, to another unsolved disappearance: her sister, Sukey, who vanished shortly after World War II.
As vivid memories of a tragedy that occurred more fifty years ago come flooding back, Maud discovers new momentum in her search for her friend. Could the mystery of Sukey’s disappearance hold the key to finding Elizabeth? (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—February 27, 1985
• Where—London, England, UK
• Education—M.A., University of East Anglia
• Awards—Costa Award, First Novel; Betty Trask Award
• Currently—lives in Norwich, England
Emma Healey holds a degree in bookbinding and an MA in creative writing. Elizabeth Is Missing is her first novel. She lives in the United Kingdom. (From the publishers.)
Book Reviews
Maud Horsham, the narrator of Emma Healey’s spellbinding first novel…is aware that she’s slipping into dementia.… It’s a sad and lonely business watching your identity slowly slip away. But even at the end, Maud insists on making herself heard and understood.
New York Times Book Review
[A] knockout debut…. Ms. Healey’s audacious conception and formidable talent combine in a bravura performance that sustains its momentum and pathos to the last.
Wall Street Journal
Elizabeth Is Missing is every bit as compelling as the… hype suggests.… The novel is both a gripping detective yarn and a haunting depiction of mental illness, but also more poignant and blackly comic than you might expect.
Observer (UK)
This is no conventional crime novel but a compelling work that crosses literary genres.… The result is bold, touching and hugely memorable.
Sunday Times (UK)
It is a gripping thriller, but it’s also about life and love: the love of an exasperated daughter for her mother; the love of sisters and of friends and the love I felt for Maud.
Independent (UK)
A compelling read, Elizabeth is Missing offers added depth of mystery and suspense along with aptly portraying a family trying to cope with illness.
New York Journal of Books
British author Healey draws on her own grandmothers’ experiences…. Few readers may want to journey through the mind of a person with dementia, but Healey demonstrates that an absorbing tale can indeed be written from such a perspective.
Publishers Weekly
(Starred review.) Delving into the mind of a woman suffering from dementia, Healey uses her unreliable narrator to create realistic tension. Suspenseful and emotional in equal parts, the author's debut hits all the right notes. —Jane Jorgenson, Madison P.L., WI
Library Journal
(Starred review.) Part mystery, part meditation on memory, part Dickensian revelation of how apparent charity may hurt its recipients, this is altogether brilliant
Booklist
Maud's memory is failing, slipping further away each day. So how can she convince anyone that her best friend is truly missing?… A poignant novel of loss.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. What interesting and complex narrative effects result from the narrator having such difficulty with her memory?
2. Consider the prominent image of summer squash in the novel. What connotations does it add to the story? What are the various effects of the repeated references?
3. What key details are introduced in the Prologue?
4. How does the consistent shift from present to past affect the telling of the story? How does the author transition between them?
5. In Chapter 1 there are several allusions to Little Red Riding Hood. In what ways might this fairy tale be relevant to the story?
6. Carla, one of Maud's caregivers, often tells of horrible crimes she's read about in the news. What does this add to the novel? How does it affect Maud?
7. What is the difference between something or someone being missing, lost, or gone? Consider various points of view.
8. In what relevant ways does the war--and all the lengthy separations it causes — affect the people and relationships in the novel?
9. What is the importance and effect of "the mad woman" throughout the novel?
10. Consider Douglas and Frank. Both seemingly have moments of menace and kindness. In what ways are they similar or different?
11. In Chapter 10, Maud, having forgotten what room she was headed to, says, "I must be going mad." In what ways is she similar to or different from the mad woman?
12. What does the subject of Maud's childhood illness add to the story?
13. Throughout her life, but especially once her sister Sukey goes missing, Maud collects random, found objects. In what various ways do physical objects come to possess meaning or value?
14. Of what particular significance to the novel is the detail of Maud collecting "boxes full of disintegrating bees and wasps and beetles"?
15. At one point, speaking to Frank, Maud denies that she has secrets, but then admits to liking the idea. In what ways might secrets be important? How can they be unhealthy?
16. Late in the novel, Maud touches something of her sister's and says, "The contact makes it possible to breathe again." What is she experiencing?
17. What does Maud's granddaughter Katy bring to the novel?
18. Consider the Epilogue. What is the effect of ending the novel with the lyric swirl of Maud's receding memories?
(Questions issued by the publisher.)
Curva Peligrosa
Lily Iona MacKenzie, 2017
Regal House Publishing
312 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780998839806
Summary
According to Steven Bauer, author of The Strange and Wonderful Tale of Robert McDoodle and A Cat of a Different Color, "Curva Peligrosa is a wildly inventive, consistently engaging, and amusing comic novel, but under its bright exterior lurk darker undertones and truths; it’s a book which attempts to say serious and important things about language, story-telling, mortality, indigenous cultures, love, and sex."
At its center is a big woman—Curva Peligrosa. Over six feet tall, she is possessed of magical powers, adventurous, amorous, sexual, and fecund. She’s got the greenest of thumbs, creating a tropical habitat in an arctic clime, and she has a wicked trigger finger.
When she rides into the town of Weed, Alberta, she’s like a vision out of a surrealistic western, with her exotic entourage—two dogs, Dios and Diosa, and two parrots, Manuel and Pedro—and her glittering gold tooth, her turquoise rings, her serape and flat-brimmed hat, her rifle and six-shooters. After a long—twenty-year-long—trek up the Old North Trail from Mexico, she’s ready to settle down a bit. Her larger-than-life presence more or less overturns the town of Weed, whose inhabitants have never seen anything like her. She’s a curiosity and a marvel, a source of light and heat, a magnet.
In fact, she’s the physical embodiment of the tornado that will hit Weed two years after her arrival, a storm that turns the place upside down and unearths a trove of bones of those who had lived on the land before the Weedites: Native Americans and prehistoric animals.
While the tornado damages Weed and disrupts the lives of its white inhabitants, it provides an opportunity for the relatively feckless (at that point) Billie One-Eye, the putative chief of the local Blackfoot tribe. As he protects the bones and dreams of preserving them, he turns into a true chief when he creates a museum that will honor them.
Curva and Billie share the book with a raft of colorful characters, borrowing from the literary tradition of South American magic realism. Curva Peligrosa attempts to bridge North and South America, Natives and whites, Americans and Canadians, urban and country, nature and technology. It pushes the limits of reality, showing how novel reality is and how real a novel can be in how both depict the everyday.
A love story, Curva Peligrosa reminds us that life is a mystery, inscrutable, as is art, one reflected in the other, an attempt to articulate what is eternally present and true. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—N/A
• Where—Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
• Education—Two M.A's., San Francisco State
• Currently—lives in Richmond, California
A Canadian by birth, a high school dropout, and a mother at 17, in her early years, Lily Iona MacKenzie supported herself as a stock girl for the Hudson’s Bay Company, as a long distance operator, and as a secretary (Bechtel Corp sponsored her into the States).
She also was a cocktail waitress at San Francisco’s Fairmont Hotel, was the first woman to work on the SF docks and almost got her legs broken, founded and managed a homeless shelter in Marin County, co-created The Story Shoppe, a weekly radio program for children, and eventually earned two Master’s degrees, one in Creative Writing and the other in the Humanities.
Her reviews, interviews, short fiction, poetry, travel pieces, essays, and memoir have appeared in over 155 American and Canadian venues. Fling! was published in 2015. Curva Peligrosa, another novel, launches in 2017. Freefall: A Divine Comedy will be released in 2018. Her poetry collection All This was published in 2011.
Lily taught at the University of San Francisco for over 30 years and currently teaches creative writing in USF’s Fromm Institute for Lifelong Learning. (From the author.)
Visit the author's website.
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Book Reviews
For those who love adult fables and supernatural tales, Curva and her mysterious powers will keep you enthralled and entertained.
K.L. Romo - Amazon Customer Review
Curva Peligrosa had me hooked from the opening paragraph. It's so easy to enter Curva's world full of memorable characters, the dead as well as the living. It was really hard to put this book down, and I felt a bit bereft when I reached the end.
Mary E. Corbett - Amazon Customer Review
Why must you read Curva Peligrosa? It's a story of the living — and dead. It is an inspiration to live life fully, and well. It's an education into history, travel, and indigenous people. it's a story of people, and change, and written with a very strong sense of place. It's full of characters you will love. And, it's a book you won't be able to put down. I loved Curva Peligrosa, and tell everyone I know about it. Highly recommended.
Jessica Voights - Amazon Customer Review
Discussion Questions
1. Curva’s letters from the trail have a unique function in the novel. How does your understanding of Curva evolve based on these letters? What role do Curva’s letters have in the narrative? How does the Old North Trail educate Curva? What difference is there in the first and third person perspectives?
2. Poems (”Bone Songs”) appear between major sections of the narrative. What is their purpose? What dimension do they add to the work?
3. Sabina appears mysteriously as Curva’s daughter. How does their relationship shift over time? How would you describe their relationship? How are mother and daughter similar and different? Who is Sabina’s father?
4. The Weedites collectively play an important role in Curva Peligrosa. How would you describe what they contribute? Who are your favorite Weedites and why?
5. Billie One Eye figures significantly in the novel. In what ways is he an important character and why? How does he complement Curva?
6. When Billie goes on his vision quest, he hopes to have the sight restored to his one eye. It isn’t, so he believes the quest was a failure. Is he correct? Why or why not?
7. Not only is Curva Peligrosa a fiction, but there also are additional fictional worlds within this novel, such as Berumba, created by the imagined novelist Luis Cardona. How do Berumba and its characters interact with Curva Peligrosa’s narrative? How is the novel about storytelling and the ways people get succor and enlightenment from it?
8. Bones of various kinds turn up in Curva. In what ways do they complicate the story?
9. The novel starts out with a tornado, and Curva’s arrival in Weed two years earlier was almost a tornado in itself. What did she introduce to the town? Is she a positive or negative influence there?
10. Sabina has important relationships with Billie and Ian. What does each contribute to the girl’s development?
11. Curva’s twin brother Xavier is more than a ghostly figure in the narrative. How do you understand his part in the book and his relationship with Curva?
12. What are the parallels between Curva and Don Quixote? Is Curva mad? Is Cervantes’ Don Quixote mad? Do Curva and the knight share the same goals? Does Curva have her own Sancho Panza?
13. Curva makes it clear from her first meeting with Shirley that he’s a danger to her and what she believes in. How do you understand his presence in the narrative and the nature of Curva’s attraction to him?
14. Does the natural world function as a character in Curva? If so, how would you describe its part in the narrative? How do you understand the greenhouse?
15. From the beginning, Curva makes known her desire to discover the elixir of life. Is she successful? Has she fulfilled her quest for immortality?
16. Curva Peligrosa fits into the magical realism genre, though realism also plays its part. Describe the magical elements in the narrative and how they interact with the more realistic ones? What qualities give Curva Peligrosa a mythic/fairy tale tone?
17. Several different worlds intersect in Curva Peligrosa: Berumba, the Blackfoot reservation, Weed before and after Curva’s arrival, the American oil scene, etc. How do you understand the ways in which they relate to each other?
18. Curva, who grew up in Mexico, resists living out the kind of traditional female role prevalent then, in Mexico and elsewhere. Is she successful?
(Questions provided courtesy of the author.)
The Mermaid and Mrs. Hancock
Imogen Hermes Gowar, 2018
HarperCollins
496 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780062859952
Summary
In 1780s London, a prosperous merchant finds his quiet life upended when he unexpectedly receives a most unusual creature—and meets a most extraordinary woman—in this much-lauded, atmospheric debut. The novel examines our capacity for wonder, obsession, and desire—with all the magnetism, originality, and literary magic of The Essex Serpent.
One September evening in 1785, Jonah Hancock hears an urgent knocking on his front door near the docks of London. The captain of one of Jonah’s trading vessels is waiting eagerly on the front step, bearing shocking news.
On a voyage to the Far East, he sold Jonah’s ship for something rare and far more precious: a mermaid. Jonah is stunned—the object the captain presents him is brown and wizened, as small as an infant, with vicious teeth and claws, and a torso that ends in the tail of a fish.
It is also dead.
As gossip spreads through the docks, coffee shops, parlors and brothels, all of London is curious to see this marvel in Jonah Hancock’s possession. Thrust from his ordinary existence, somber Jonah finds himself moving from the city’s seedy underbelly to the finest drawing rooms of high society.
At an opulent party, he makes the acquaintance of the coquettish Angelica Neal, the most desirable woman he has ever laid eyes on—and a shrewd courtesan of great accomplishment. This meeting sparks a perilous liaison that steers both their lives onto a dangerous new course as they come to realize that priceless things often come at the greatest cost.
Imogen Hermes Gowar, Britain’s most-heralded new literary talent, makes her debut with this spellbinding novel of a merchant, a mermaid, and a madam—an unforgettable confection that explores obsession, wonder, and the deepest desires of the heart with bawdy wit, intrigue, and a touch of magic. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—1987
• Where—in the UK
• Education—B.A., M.A., University of East Anglia
• Awards—Curtis Brown Award
• Currently—lives in London, England
Imogen Hermes Gowar studied Archaeology, Anthropology and Art History at the University of East Anglia’s (UEA) Sainsbury Centre for Visual Arts before going on to work in museums. She began to write small pieces of fiction inspired by the artefacts she worked with and around, and in 2013 won the Malcolm Bradbury Memorial Scholarship to study for an MA in Creative Writing at UEA.
She won the Curtis Brown Prize for her dissertation, which grew into what would become her debut novel—The Mermaid and Mrs Hancock. An early draft was a finalist in the MsLexia First Novel Competition 2015, and it was also one of three entries shortlisted for the inaugural Deborah Rogers Foundation Writers’ Award. (From the publisher.)
Book Reviews
A gripping… study of the intertwined lives of sex workers and high society in Georgian London…. Themes… —of independence, love, class, death and gender stereotypes—are skilfully explored here through a late 18th-century lens.
Financial Times (UK)
Superb…. A cracking historical novel… by turns intriguing, touching, funny, sad and heartwarming…. The cast of endlessly engaging characters will keep you turning the pages until you get to the wholly satisfying ending…. The novel immerses you in a world in a way that reminds me of Susanna Clarke’s Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell.
Times (UK)
A swift, rollicking read…. Richly descriptive…. Like the recent historical-fiction hits Francis Spufford’s Golden Hill, Sarah Perry’s The Essex Serpent, and Jessie Burton’s The Miniaturist, this is a novel pungent in historical detail.
Sunday Times (UK)
Historical fiction at its finest, combining myth and legend with the brutal realities of the past, chief among them the mistreatment of women and black people and the inequality that existed among the classes. Comparisons will be drawn to the works of contemporary authors Sarah Waters and Michael Faber… but The Mermaid and Mrs Hancock has more in common with the novels of Dickens and Austen.
Irish Times (UK)
There is much to chew on here, and much to savour, presented with wit and showmanship…. The elan of this book is female, from the madams running their girls, to the book’s most obvious literary forebear, Angela Carter’s Nights at the Circus. Imogen Hermes Gowar is the real deal.
Guardian (UK)
From the first page of this dazzling debut novel, you are pitched into a sumptuously detailed adventure set in the bustle and swagger of 18th century London.… The result is a wonderfully written and richly descriptive novel, its brilliantly drawn characters driven by heady and dangerous desires.
Sunday Express (UK)
(Starred review) [D]elightful…. This is, indeed, a kind of fairy tale, one whose splendid combination of myth and reality testifies to Gowar’s imagination and talent.
Publishers Weekly
(Starred review) Concerned with the issue of women’s freedom, Gowar offers a panoramic view of Georgian society, from its coffeehouses and street life to class distinctions and multicultural populace.… {A] sumptuous historical feast.
Booklist
(Starred review) Brilliantly written and redolent with evocative historical detail, this debut novel is as much a portrait of Georgian London as it is of the characters inhabiting it. —Cynthia Johnson, formerly with Cary Memorial Lib., Lexington, MA
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
We'll add publisher questions if and when they're available; in the meantime, use our LitLovers talking points to help start a discussion for THE MERMAID AND MRS. HANCOCK ... then take off on your own:
BEWARE OF PLOT SPOILERS.
1. How would you describe Jonah Hancock? Do you consider him an honest man? An opportunist? A simpleton? Is he interesting enough character to carry the bulk of the novel?
2. Bet Chappell: what do you think of her? What does her pornographic mermaid burlesque say about her understanding of society's mores in the late 1700s?
3. Angelica Neal is a prostitute who beguiles Jonah into turning over his mermaid to Chappell. How else would you describe her? She is in love with George Rockingham, so were you surprised that she agreed to marry Jonah? Clearly the two make an unlikely couple: what do you think of the marriage?
4. What do you make of the remark to the newly married Angelica that "You are helpless. You are kept… Perhaps you mistake this for independence, but you are still a whore"?
5. Follow-up to Question 4: Consider the thematic parallels that Imogen Hermes Gowar sets up between the mermaid and the female characters in the novel. Talk about the way the author combines myth and legend with the brutal realities, especially for women (and slaves) of 18th century life.
6. How surprised were you (unless you knew beforehand from book reviews) to learn of the live mermaid Jonah kept in the grotto in the back garden?
7. The author writes that the mermaid, contained in her saltwater vat, is a "great voluptuous sorrow rolling over." What does that statement mean? Talk about the affect the trapped mermaid has over Jonah's Greenwich household and his marriage.
8. What do you make of Angelica's change in personality toward the end? Is it convincing?
9. Which other characters were you particularly taken with—in a positive and/or negative way.
10. To what degree does the author's background working in museums reveal itself in her novel? What difference does it make in the juxtaposition of reality and fantasy?
(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online and off, with attribution. Thanks.)