Golden Child
Claire Adam, 2019
Crown/Archetype
288 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780525572992
Summary
A new novel from Sarah Jessica Parker’s imprint, SJP for Hogarth: a deeply affecting debut novel set in Trinidad, following the lives of a family as they navigate impossible choices about scarcity, loyalty, and love
Rural Trinidad: a brick house on stilts surrounded by bush; a family, quietly surviving, just trying to live a decent life.
Clyde, the father, works long, exhausting shifts at the petroleum plant in southern Trinidad; Joy, his wife, looks after the home. Their two sons, thirteen years old, wake early every morning to travel to the capital, Port of Spain, for school. They are twins but nothing alike: Paul has always been considered odd, while Peter is widely believed to be a genius, destined for greatness.
When Paul goes walking in the bush one afternoon and doesn't come home, Clyde is forced to go looking for him, this child who has caused him endless trouble already, and who he has never really understood.
And as the hours turn to days, and Clyde begins to understand Paul’s fate, his world shatters—leaving him faced with a decision no parent should ever have to make.
Like the Trinidadian landscape itself, Golden Child is both beautiful and unsettling; a resoundingly human story of aspiration, betrayal, and love. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—N/A
• Where—Trinidad
• Education—B.S., Brown University; M.A., London University
• Currently—lives in London
Claire Adam was born and raised on the island of Trinidad to two doctors. Her mother, from Ireland, and her father, from Trinidad, met while working in a hospital in Nottingham in England. Adam is the youngest of four siblings (a brother and two sisters).
Adam left Trinidad to study physics at Brown University in the U.S. Later she earned her MA from the University of London, where she still lives. Golden Child is her first novel. (From various online sources.)
Book Reviews
In fluid and uncluttered prose, Golden Child weaves an enveloping portrait of an insular social order in which the claustrophobic support of family and neighbors coexists with an omnipresent threat from the same corners.
Jan Stuart - New York Times Book Review
[An] emotionally potent debut novel… with a spare, evocative style, Adam (a Trinidad native) evokes the island’s complexity during the mid-'80s, when the novel is mostly set: the tenuous relationship between Hindus like Clyde’s family and the twins’ Catholic schoolmaster, assassinations and abductions hyped by lurid media headlines, resources that attract carpetbagging oil companies but leave the country largely impoverished.
USA Today
Golden Child is a beautiful and haunting tale, one that leaves readers thinking long after the last page has been turned.
Associated Press
This book manages to combine two things rarely bound together in the same spine: a sensitive depiction of family life and the page-flicking urgency of a thriller.
Guardian (UK)
This is a tough, original novel of remarkable poise and confidence.
Economist (UK)
[A] powerful debut… a devastating family portrait—and a fascinating window into Trinidadian society.
People
★ Adam’s excellent debut explores a dark and haunting Sophie’s Choice-like dilemma…. Throughout this stunning portrait of Trinidad… and one family’s sacrifices, soaring hopes and ultimate despair, Adam weaves a poetic lightness and beauty that will transfix readers.
Publishers Weekly
The novel starts off slowly but gains momentum… with the family dynamics getting more complicated as… family divisions, conflicts, and betrayals are revealed. The last third of the book reads like a thriller but never loses its emotional depth. —Pamela Mann, St. Mary's Coll. Lib., MD
Library Journal
★ Adam's writing is luxuriant, evoking the atmospheric island setting and the complicated, worried lives lived under a near-constant sense of impending violence…. Heartbreaking and lovely, this is an important work by a promising new voice.
Booklist
[T]he novel telegraphs its biggest plot twist. [As] a result Clyde's decision isn't harrowing; by the time its necessary consequences unfold, a reader might be less moved than Adam hopes.… [Still] Adam has… written an incisive and loving portrait of contemporary Trinidad.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. Why is Clyde hesitant to accept help from people, even family? Do you think Uncle Vishnu is genuine in his desire to help? Do you trust him?
2. Why does Joy insist that the twins attend the same school?
3. Should Peter be responsible for looking after Paul, even if it impedes his progress?
4. While living, Uncle Vishnu helped keep the Deyalsinghs afloat, improving Peter’s prospects and securing his future. How does his death affect them in the immediate and distant future? How does his death affect the family, as a whole, in the immediate and distant future?
5. Is Romesh right in feeling that he, as well as the rest of the family, is entitled to a portion of the money that Uncle Vishnu left for Peter? How do you foresee this affecting relationships within the family moving forward?
6. Does putting Paul in St. Saviour’s—a school he’s not qualified to attend—for the sake of keeping the twins together, help or hurt him?
7. What do you make of Father Kavanagh assuring Paul that he’s normal, contrary to what others have said his whole life? Is he right? Is too much made of Paul’s deficiencies? Do you think Father Kavanagh oversteps his boundaries in expressing this belief to Clyde?
8. What effect does Father Kavanagh’s assurance have on Paul? How does it affect their relationship, as well as Father Kavanagh’s relationship with Clyde?
9. Paul initially stands up to the bandits during their attempted robbery. When they later approach him outside of the house, Paul all but surrenders. Why does he submit the second time around?
10. Why does Clyde opt not to use Vishnu’s money for Paul’s ransom despite the mounting pressure from the kidnappers, Joy, and, then, Peter?
11. Does Clyde make enough of an effort to bring Paul home safely? Because of his actions, or lack thereof, is he ultimately responsible for what happens to Paul?
12. Is it right to sacrifice the future (or life) of one child to ensure the future of another if the latter’s is assuredly brighter? Would you make the same decision as Clyde?
13. In the airport, Peter thinks to himself, Paul has played his part. Daddy has played his part. What do you make of each person’s role in Peter’s eventual success? How should Clyde feel about his role, especially after Paul’s death? How do you think Paul would feel about his role? Do you think he sacrificed himself in order to protect his family?
14. Should Peter feel guilty about attending Harvard after Paul’s death?
15. What does Clyde’s reaction at the end of the book reveal about his guilt? Does he think what he did (or didn’t do) was worth it? In your opinion, was it worth it?
16. What do you think are a parent’s obligations to his or her children?
(Questions issued by the publisher.)
The Wartime Sisters
Lynda Cohen Loigman, 2019
St. Martin Press
304 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781250140708
Summary
A powerful novel about two sisters working in a WWII armory, each with a deep secret.
Two estranged sisters, raised in Brooklyn and each burdened with her own shocking secret, are reunited at the Springfield Armory in the early days of WWII.
While one sister lives in relative ease on the bucolic Armory campus as an officer’s wife, the other arrives as a war widow and takes a position in the Armory factories as a "soldier of production." Resentment festers between the two, and secrets are shattered when a mysterious figure from the past reemerges in their lives. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—ca. 1969
• Where—Longmeadow, Massachusetts, USA
• Education—B.A., Harvard College; J.D., Columbia Law School
• Currently—lives in Chappaqua, NY
Lynda Cohen Loigman grew up in Longmeadow, Massachusetts. She received a B.A. in English and American Literature from Harvard College and a law degree from Columbia Law School. She practiced trusts and estates law in New York City for eight years before moving out of the city to raise her two children with her husband.
Loigman wrote The Two-Family House while she was a student of the Writing Institute at Sarah Lawrence College. The novel was chosen by Goodreads as a best book of the month for March, 2016, and was nominee for the Goodreads 2016 Choice Awards in Historical Fiction. The Wartime Sisters is her second novel.
Book Reviews
The Wartime Sisters is an indictment of how we judge others by their looks. Lynda Loigman explores the roles women played during World War II and won freedom. Never ever the role of women during World War II was explained in such a brilliant way in a book of fiction.
Washington Book Review
Historical fiction fans will love Lynda Cohen Loigman's The Wartime Sisters―a fresh take on the World War II novel. Sisters Ruth and Millie find themselves back in each other's lives after a long estrangement when Millie and her son turn up on Ruth's doorstep needing a place to stay. While the two help the war effort by working at an armory factory in Massachusetts, their past secrets bubble to the surface.
Real Simple
This touching book tells the story of two sisters who are reunited during World War II. The problem (other than, you know, war)? One sister is living the "good" life as an officer's wife, while the other is a factory worker―causing understandable tension that strains their bond. Read this, and then give your own sister a call.
Woman's Day
Estranged sisters seek connection and purpose at the Springfield Armory during the tumult of WWII…. With measured, lucid prose, Loigman tells a moving story of women coming together in the face of difficulties, both personal and global, and doing anything to succeed.
Publishers Weekly
Loigman provides a behind-the-scenes look, in alternating points of view, at women fighting their own wars at home.… [A] heartfelt picture of women's daily life during wartime through the eyes of two extraordinary sisters. —Laura Jones, Argos Community Schs., IN
Library Journal
With a perceptive lens on the challenges of whittling away grievances that have built up over years, The Wartime Sisters is a powerful pressure cooker of a family drama.
Booklist
[F]our women negotiate the World War II homefront.… The stark, painful depiction of "looks-ism," 1930s style, undercuts the anodyne message of the novel's resolution. Though it highlights historic advances for women, this book is really about gender discrimination in the home.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. What is it about the sisters’ relationship that makes it so ripe for storytelling?
2. Throughout their childhood, Ruth and Millie’s mother has vastly different expectations for them, especially in terms of the kind of men they will marry. Do you think she bears some of the blame for the poor relationship between her daughters? What about their father?
3. When Millie first meets Lenny, she is lonely and mourning the loss of her neighbor. Why else do you think Millie falls for Lenny? Why does she agree to marry him?
4. Do you think it was wrong of Ruth’s mother to expect her to bring Millie with her to her new home? Why was it so important for Ruth to have a fresh start in Springfield? Did being Jewish make it harder for Ruth to ft in at the armory?
5. Do you think Ruth’s lies to Lenny and her sister are excusable? If you were Millie, would you ever be able to forgive Ruth for what she did?
6. Do you think Millie’s secrets about Lenny and her marriage are more or less justifiable than the secrets Ruth keeps?
7. In what ways do Arietta and Lillian serve as substitute sisters for Millie? Why do you think they are so protective of her? How does the war bring these women together?
8. How does Lillian’s past shape her as an adult? Do you think she would have been able to defend Millie the way she does at the end of the story had it not been for her own unfortunate childhood experiences?
9. Ruth and Millie can’t seem to escape the roles they took on as children. Do you think family members always fall into set patterns of behavior? Can the patterns ever be broken, or are we destined to play the same roles within our family units from childhood through old age?
10. When Millie first arrives in Springfield, she has no money and almost no luggage. Do you think Ruth truly understands Millie’s predicament? Should she have been more generous? Why are class differences among adult family members so difficult to overcome?
11. How do Grace’s prejudices affect her actions? Why do you think she was so jealous of Millie? Should Ruth have come to her sister’s defense sooner?
12. Do you think Millie and Ruth will be able to move beyond their past grievances and have a sincere and positive relationship in the future?
(Questions issued by the publisher.)
At the Wolf's Table
Rosella Postorino, 2019 (2018 in Italy; as The Tasters)
Flatiron Books
288 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781250179142
Summary
The international bestseller based on a haunting true story that raises provocative questions about complicity, guilt, and survival.
They called it the Wolfsschanze, the Wolf’s Lair. "Wolf" was his nickname. As hapless as Little Red Riding Hood, I had ended up in his belly. A legion of hunters was out looking for him, and to get him in their grips they would gladly slay me as well.
Germany, 1943: Twenty-six-year-old Rosa Sauer’s parents are gone, and her husband Gregor is far away, fighting on the front lines of World War II.
Impoverished and alone, she makes the fateful decision to leave war-torn Berlin to live with her in-laws in the countryside, thinking she’ll find refuge there.
But one morning, the SS come to tell her she has been conscripted to be one of Hitler’s tasters: three times a day, she and nine other women go to his secret headquarters, the Wolf’s Lair, to eat his meals before he does.
Forced to eat what might kill them, the tasters begin to divide into The Fanatics, those loyal to Hitler, and the women like Rosa who insist they aren’t Nazis, even as they risk their lives every day for Hitler’s.
As secrets and resentments grow, this unlikely sisterhood reaches its own dramatic climax, as everyone begins to wonder if they are on the wrong side of history. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—1978
• Where—Reggio Calabria, Italy
• Raised—San Lorenzo al Mare, Ligura
• Education—N/A
• Awards—Campiello Prize, Pozzale Luigi Russo Award, Rapallo Prize, and others
• Currently—lives in Rome, Italy
Rosella Postorino is a bestselling Italian author and an editor. She was born in Reggion Calabria, the toe of Italy, at the narrow strait separating the mainland from Sicily. She grew up farther north, however, in Liguria, the region known as the Italian Riveria.
Postorino speaks fluent English, Italian, French, and German. Her novels have garnered numerous Italian literary awards. At the Wolf’s Table is her first to be translated into English.
Novels
2007 - The room above
2009 - The summer that we lost God
2013 - The docile body
2018 - The tasters (At the Wolf's Table, 2019 in the U.S.)
(Author bio adapted from online sources. Retrieved 2/25/2019.)
Book Reviews
[E]ngrossing.… [Postorino's] ability to beautifully convey feelings of guilt, shame, love and remorse in a single gesture is a sign that we will be hearing more from her.
Susan Ellingwood - New York Times Book Review
Postorino reconstructs a truly unusual everyday existence in which the rules have changed and there is no room for accommodations…. With literary skill she weaves together historical facts and fiction.
Corriere della Sera (Italy)
Hailed as the new The Reader… the wording is rich, precise. At every twist and turn, the masterfully developed narration avoids predictability and comforting outcomes, up to the surprise ending.
La Repubblica (Italy)
This book―which speaks of love, hunger, survival and remorse―will end up engraved on your heart.
Marie Claire (Italy)
Unsettling and compelling.… At the Wolf’s Table stays with you, and for a long time.
La Repubblica (Italy)
Masterful…A unique story in which every reader will see themselves reflected.
L’Unione Sarda (Italy)
You’ll fly into this novel with your heart in your throat and a constant feeling of identification all the way through to the final, magnificent chapter.
Io Donna (Italy)
Compelling and truly well written.
Huffington Post (Italy)
A necessary book of great power that brings to mind Primo Levi’s The Drowned and the Saved and the finest Italian fiction.
La Riviera (France)
As engaging as a great film.
Vanity Fair (Italy)
Discussion Questions
1. Though she risks her life every day for Hitler, Rosa claims not to be a Nazi. Do you agree? How is her involvement in the war similar to or different from her husband Gregor’s, who enlisted to fight?
2. Rosa imagines her father telling her
You’re responsible for any regime you tolerate.… Each person’s existence is granted by the system of the state in which she lives,even that of a hermit, can’t you understand that? You’re not free from political guilt, Rosa.
Do you agree? How does this novel address the idea of collective guilt in Germany? Are any of the characters innocent?
3. Rosa never meets Hitler, but his presence hangs over the entire novel. What role does he play in the story? Discuss the different ways in which the characters view him.
4. Rosa compares herself to Little Red Riding Hood, and Hitler to the wolf: "I had ended up in his belly. A legion of hunters was out looking for him, and to get him in their grips they would gladly slay me as well." Do you think the comparison holds up? Are there other fairy-tale elements to Rosa’s story?
5. Rosa describes her love with Gregor as either "a mouth that doesn’t bite, or the opportunity to unexpectedly attack the other, like a dog that turns against its master." What does she mean? How do we see that duality—safety and danger—in her relationships throughout the novel?
6. Rosa keeps secrets from her loved ones from a very early age. She says of her childhood relationship with her mother:
My pain at the wrong I had done to her was so great that the only way to bear it was to love my mother less, to say nothing, to keep it a secret. The only way to survive my love for my mother was to betray that love.
Discuss that apparent paradox. How else do secrets shape Rosa’s life and relationships?
7. Rosa tells us: "The ability to adapt is human beings’ greatest resource, but the more I adapted, the less human I felt." What do you think she means? How does this novel address sacrifice and survival?
8. Rosa never asks Albert directly about his experiences at the concentration camps: "I was afraid and couldn’t speak and didn’t want to know." What do you make of their relationship? What draws them together and keeps them apart? Do you consider Albert a villain in this story? Does Rosa’s romantic involvement with him make her guilty or culpable in some way?
9. Rosa argues, "There’s no such thing as universal compassion—only being moved to compassion before the fate of a single human being." Do you think there’s any truth to that? How does the novel either bear out or contradict that statement?
10. Much of this novel is about female friendship. What is the nature of Rosa’s relationships with the other tasters? How does her outsider status, as a Berliner rather than a villager, play a role? How does this novel address issues of class and status, particularly through Rosa’s friendship with the Baroness?
11. Among the tasters, Rosa is closest to Elfriede, another outsider with secrets. How are the two women similar and different, and why do they develop such an intense friendship?
12. Why do you think Elfriede risks everything to help Heike get an abortion and, later,tell the SS guards that Leni was raped? When Elfriede is found out and deported,Rosa tells Albert, "It’s our fault." Do you agree? Why or why not?
13. Rosa and Gregor’s marriage doesn’t last after the war, in part because they were too careful with one another:
If only we had shared our memories, I told myself at times. We couldn’t. To us it would have seemed like squandering our miracle. Instead we tried to protect it, to protect one another. For the rest of those years we were trying so hard to protect one another that we ended up with nothing but that: barricades.
Rosa never tells Gregor about her experiences as a taster and never tries to track down anyone from her past. Why does she make those decisions?
14. Discuss Rosa’s views on loss:
When you lose someone, the pain you feel is for yourself, the pain that you’ll never see them again, never hear their voice again, that without them, you think, you’ll never make it. Pain is selfish.
Would you describe Rosa’s choices in this novel as selfish? Is survival inherently selfish?
15. At the Wolf’s Table is based on the true story of the women who served as Hitler’s food tasters. Were you aware of that piece of history? Did you come away from this novel with a different understanding of World War II and the Holocaust? Do you sympathize with Rosa and the other tasters?
(Questions issued by the publisher.)
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The Lost Man
Jane Harper, 2019
Flatiron Books
352 pp.
ISBN-13: 9781250105684
Summary
Two brothers meet in the remote Australian outback when the third brother is found dead, in this stunning new standalone novel from Jane Harper
Brothers Nathan and Bub Bright meet for the first time in months at the remote fence line separating their cattle ranches in the lonely outback.
Their third brother, Cameron, lies dead at their feet.
In an isolated belt of Australia, their homes a three-hour drive apart, the brothers were one another’s nearest neighbors. Cameron was the middle child, the one who ran the family homestead. But something made him head out alone under the unrelenting sun.
Nathan, Bub and Nathan’s son return to Cameron’s ranch and to those left behind by his passing: his wife, his daughters, and his mother, as well as their long-time employee and two recently hired seasonal workers.
While they grieve Cameron’s loss, suspicion starts to take hold, and Nathan is forced to examine secrets the family would rather leave in the past. Because if someone forced Cameron to his death, the isolation of the outback leaves few suspects.
A powerful and brutal story of suspense set against a formidable landscape, The Lost Man confirms Jane Harper, author of The Dry and Force of Nature, is one of the best new voices in writing today. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—1979-80
• Where—Manchester, England, UK
• Education—B.A., University of Kent (Canterbury, England)
• Currently—lives in St. Kilda, Victoria, Australia
Jane Harper is an Englisn-born, partially Australian-raised writer, now living in Australia. She is the author of The Dry (2016/2017), Force of Nature (2018), and The Lost Man (2019)—all crime novels set in Australia.
Jane was born in Manchester, England, but her family moved to a subrub of Melbourne, Australia, where she lived till she was six. The family then returned to England, and Jane attended the University of Kent where she earned her B.A., in History and English.
Her first job out of school was as a journalist (yes, she actually had to pass a qualifying exam). She first worked for the Darlington & Stockton Times and, later, as senior news editor for the Hull Daily Mail, both papers in Yorkshire, England.
But Australia beckoned, and in 2008 Jane returned to her early childhood stromping grounds, again working in journalism—first for the Geelong Advertiser, then in 2011 for the Herald Sun in Melbourne.
After she had a short story accepted for inclusion in the annual Fiction Edition of The Big Issue (Melbourne), Jane turned to fiction writing in a serious way. In 2014, she signed up for a 12-week online creative writing course. The story she submitted for acceptance into the program turned out to be the beginning of her novel, The Dry. By the end of the three months, Jane had her first draft of the novel.
Making this almost a fairytale come true, Jane felt confident enough to enter the novel's third draft in the Victorian Premier’s Literary Award for an Unpublished Manuscript. It won the $15,000 prize in May, 2015, and Pan Macmillan paid a non-specified “six-figure” sum for a three-book deal.
Jane and her husband live in St. Kilda, outside of Melbourne, with their daughter. Jane now writes fiction full time. (Adapted from the author's website and news.com.au.)
Book Reviews
Harper's books succeed in part because she conveys how even now, geography can be fate. Heat and empty space in her work defeat modernity, defeat logic, technology and even love, throwing us back upon our irreducible selves. By the time she reveals the (brilliantly awful) back story about Nathan's banishment from the few human comforts of Balamara—the pub, for example—the reader feels frantic for their restoration. The final pages of The Lost Man are somewhat predictable, but Harper is skillful enough, a prickly, smart, effective storyteller, that it doesn't matter. She's often cynical, but always humane. Book by book, she's creating her own vivid and complex account of the outback, and its people who live where people don't live.
Charles Finch - New York Times Book Review
If you liked The Dry, you'll love it. The Lost Man is an even better book, gripping right to the end. This terrific piece of outback noir opens with the discovery of a body.… Harper… paints the menacing landscape brilliantly. The book's title could easily relate to several of the male characters. This engrossing novel will have you thinking long after you've turned the last page.
Melbourne Herald Sun (Aus)
Fabulously atmospheric, the book starts slowly and gradually picks up pace towards a jaw-dropping denouement.
Guardian (UK)
Her best yet; it's certainly one of the finest novels of any sort, not only within the genre, that I've read in many moons.… Harper adroitly blends the tension and brisk pace of a thriller with the psychological acuity and stylish prose of literary fiction.
Irish Independent
Engrossing…Storytelling at its finest.
Associated Press
Nothing about this novel is predictable. The characters are compelling, the plot is thrilling and the ending is so very satisfying. There’s something special about getting to the end of a book and figuring out the mystery. You’ll be left feeling content, a little shocked and desperate for more.
Marie Claire (Aus)
[A] crime masterpiece. The landscape and culture of this remote Australian territory are magnificently evoked as a story of family secrets unfolds. Rarely does a puzzle so complicated fit together perfectly—you’ll be shaking your head in amazement.
People
A nuanced but pulse-pounding thriller set in the heart of the Australian Outback, where two brothers find their sibling dead.
Entertainment Weekly
Harper’s sinewy prose and flinty characters compel, but the dreary story line may cause some readers to give up before the jaw-dropping denouement.
Publishers Weekly
[T]he Australian landscape looms large, and it's difficult to imagine the events in this novel playing out the same way anywhere else. Verdict: Even if readers guess why Cam died, they're likely to be kept guessing the how and the who until the end. —Stephanie Klose
Library Journal
The atmosphere is so thick you can taste the red-clay dust, and the folklore… adds an additional edge to an already dark and intense narrative. [A] surprising ending… reveals how far someone will go to preserve a life worth living in a place at once loathed and loved.
Booklist
★ [A] masterful narrative… in the middle of a desolate landscape… where the effects of long-term isolation are always a concern. The mystery… will leave readers reeling, and the final reveal is a heartbreaker. A twisty slow burner by an author at the top of her game.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
We'll add publisher questions if and when they're available; in the meantime, please use our GENERIC MYSTERY QUESTIONS to start a discussion for THE LOST MAN … then take off on your own:
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.)
The City in the Middle of the Night
Charlie Jane Anders, 2019
Tor Books
368 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780765379962
Summary
If you control our sleep, then you can own our dreams... And from there, it's easy to control our entire lives.
January is a dying planet—divided between a permanently frozen darkness on one side, and blazing endless sunshine on the other. Humanity clings to life, spread across two archaic cities built in the sliver of habitable dusk.
But life inside the cities is just as dangerous as the uninhabitable wastelands outside.
Sophie, a student and reluctant revolutionary, is supposed to be dead, after being exiled into the night. Saved only by forming an unusual bond with the enigmatic beasts who roam the ice, Sophie vows to stay hidden from the world, hoping she can heal.
But fate has other plans—and Sophie's ensuing odyssey and the ragtag family she finds will change the entire world. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
• Birth—N/A
• Raised—Manchester, Connecticut, USA
• Education—Cambridge University
• Awards—Nebula Award, Hugo Award
• Currently—lives in San Francisco, California
Charlie Jane Anders is a website co-creator and editor, a short story writer, and author of sci-fi / fantasy novels—All the Birds in the Sky (2016) and The City in the Middle of the Night (2019).
Anders was raised in Mansfield, Connecticut. She went to Cambridge University in England where she studied English and Asian literature, prompting her to study abroad in China. Following college, she spent time in Hong Kong and Boston and now makes her home in San Francisco, California.
Career
In 2007, along with Annalee Newitz, Anders helped co-found the popular Gawker Media site, io9—a blog devoted to science fiction and fantasy. She worked as editor-in-chief until 2016 when she left to concentrate on her writing.
In 2016 Anders published her debut sci-fi / fantasy novel, All the Birds in the Sky. The book earned her the 2017 Nebula Awards for Best Novel, was a finalist for the year's Hugo Best Novel category, and climbed to the number five spot on Time magazine's top 10 novels list. An earlier novelette, "Six Months, Three Days," published in 2013 on Tor.com, also won a Hugo Award.
Anders has been publishing short stories since 1999—more than 100—in a variety of genres. Her fiction has been published by McSweeney's, Lightspeed, and ZYZZYVA. Her journalism has appeared in Salon, Wall Street Journal, Mother Jones, Atlantic Monthly, and other outlets.
Events
In addition to writing, Anders has spent years as an event organizer. She organized a "ballerina pie fight" in 2005 for other magazine; co-organized the "Cross-Gender Caravan," a national transgender and genderqueer author tour; and a "Bookstore and Chocolate Crawl" in San Francisco. Anders also emcees an award-winning monthly reading series "Writers with Drinks," a San Francisco-based event begun in 2001 that features authors from a wide range of genres.
Personal
Since 2000, Anders has been partnered with Annalee Newitz. In addition to the io9 blog, the couple co-founded other magazine and hosted the podcast Our Opinions Are Correct.
Anders is transgender. In 2007, she brought attention to a discriminatory policy of San Francisco bisexual women's organization, The Chasing Amy Social Club, that specifically barred pre-operative transgender women from membership. (Adapted from Wikipedia and other online sources. Retrieved 2/26/2019.)
Book Reviews
★ Intricate, embracing much of what makes a grand adventure: smugglers, revolutionaries, pirates, camaraderie, personal sacrifice, wondrous discovery, and the struggle to find light in the darkness. Breathlessly exciting and thought-provoking.
Publishers Weekly
★ The planet of January was colonized long ago, but now it is dying.… [A]n intricate tale of colonialism and evolution on both physical and social levels. The harsh world and well-developed characters combine with stunning storytelling that will capture readers' minds and hearts. —Kristi Chadwick, Massachusetts Lib. Syst., Northampton
Library Journal
★ An even stronger novel than Anders’ Nebula Award–winning All the Birds in the Sky; a tale that can stand beside such enduring works as Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Left Hand of Darkness, Frank Herbert’s Dune, and Dan Simmons’ Hyperion.
Booklist
★ [A] sweeping work of anthropological/social sf.… Anders contains multitudes; it's always a fascinating and worthwhile surprise to see what she comes up with next.
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 CITY IN THE MIDDLE OF THE NIGHT … then take off on your own:
1. Of course we are meant to like Sophie, and we do. What characteristics does she possess that make her likeable, admirable even? What do you see as her flaws?
2. Follow-up to Question 1: Discuss Bianca's theft and Sophie's willingness to take the blame for her? Why to both actions? What is it about Sophie that leads her to cling to, indeed to sacrifice herself for, Bianca? As she herself says, "I can't stop throwing away my life for Bianca. It's all I ever do."
3. Follow-up to Questions 1 and 2: In what way do Sophie and Bianca reflect the caste system of this world. To what degree is it reflective of our own: the same, somewhat better, or worse?
4. Consider the following passage about the city of Xiosphant…
The founders of that city had a valid theory of human nature, but they took it too far. That's the problem with grand social ideas in general, they break if you put too much weight on them.
A lot to unpack in those two sentences:
- What is the "valid theory" the city's founders propound, and how do they "take it too far"?
- How would you describe living in Xiosphant—the individual daily life, social structure and interactions between citizens, laws and punishments? What is the overall quality of life?
5. Follow-up to Question 4: what is meant by the passage's "grand social ideas" and why do they break? How might that statement apply to our own world's history of grand ideas: monarchy, democracy, capitalism, socialism, communism, religion?
6. Overall, which city would you choose to live in (if you had to choose!)—Xiosphant or Argelo?
7. Then, of course, there are the crocodiles, which (whom?) Sophie calls the Gelet. Describe them: are you able to overcome the fact that they look like giant lobsters? Talk about the connection that Sophie develops with them and what she learns from them.
8. Humans—who hate the Gelet, see them as prey, and eat them—display the worst possible qualities of humanity. Clearly Charlie Jane Anders is offering serious social commentary. What is the author suggesting about the human race, especially our treatment of the environment and of one another? Do you consider her view overly harsh or spot on?
9. Talk about Mouth and her trials. Do you like her—initially, later, or never? In other words, does your attitude toward her change?
10. What does Mouth reveal about the planet itself—its backstory and the impact of human habitation.
m. Mouth sums up her own struggle and that of many of the book's characters: "The dead were just like the living: they all wanted something they could never have." What does she mean by that? Is that our fate as human beings: to want what we can never have? If so, what is it we want?
11. The technology keeping January's citizens alive is crumbling, but no one seems capable of dealing with change. Sound familiar?
12. The book suggests that humans can never be brought to care about the plight of those whom they find repulsive or to show concern about the damage they have caused the to the planet. Do you find this trait realistic? Or is the novel's view of humanity too dark and fatalistic?
13. By the end of the book, how do you see Sophie? In what way has she changed, grown, become wiser or stronger?
14. How do you feel about the book's ending? Does it end too abruptly for you? Or is its conclusion a logical outcome? How would you end the novel?
(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online and off, with attribution. Thanks.)