the solace of leaving early book discussion

Welcome, welcome, my dearies to The Creamery's first book discussion! Thank you for reading the book.

Here's how we're going to make this work. I'll be posting some questions below that will hopefully give us some good seeds for discussion. You have three choices for participating.

1. Pick a question for your response. In the comment form, cut and paste the original question (or at least part of it)- and then your response to it. Do the same for each question you'd like to respond to - or group them together in one comment, but still try to include the original question or some part of it so we all know what you're talking about.

or

2. Respond to someone else's response. That one's pretty self explanatory.

or

3. Post your own thoughts and questions, if they aren't already represented here.


Ultimately, please feel free to comment as many times as you want--- the more participation we have, the better this will go. I will pop in with my thoughts as well, of course--- we'll keep this going until end of day Sunday.

Please remember that everyone has an individual point of view, and should be valued as such. You're such a polite and kind group I doubt we'll have any problems with this, but it's still good to put out there. Please play nicely, kids. What makes me so excited about this little social Internet experiment we've got going here is that each of you are very different people, with very different opinions. I'm really excited to see what we all come up with.


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Now on to The Solace of Leaving Early by Haven Kimmel


There are a lot of secrets in the novel - those kept from the reader as well as those kept between characters themselves: Langston's reasons for leaving her PhD, Anna Lee's reasons for fearing her own mother, Alice's story, Taos, Beulah's secret of running away to circus college, the reason the girls wear the costumes. Kimmel gives these secrets time to unravel. Do you think this is a useful device or a distracting one? Why is it that secrets play such a strong role in the novel? Secret lives, the secrets we keep from the we love, the secrets that help us and harm us. Is Kimmel making a statement about secrets in a small town, or are secrets just a way that we live and communicate in our world at large?


What does it mean that Langston doesn't want to know how Alice died--do you think this helps her relationship with the girls?


Is it better to know the truth and act on it, or to live in blissful ignorance? Are there examples of people who live these ideals in the novel? Who?


Do Langston and the girls understand each other? Do they speak the same language? How?


Want does it mean to "minister" to people? Is Amos a good minister? What decides this? Do you think he considers himself to be a good minister?


How is it that Langston and Amos fall in love? DO they fall in love? When (if ever) does this take place?


Does Beulah "see" clearly? Is her insight due to the fact that, in reality, she is losing her actual vision? What does she see?


When Amos talks with Anna Lee in the hospital, he discovers that he has been underestimating her. What other examples of underestimating do we see in the novel? Does Langston underestimate anyone?


Are you satisfied that the visions the girls had of Mary weren't explained or even detailed? Do you think they continue to have these visions, even after they are living with Langston and Amos? What role did the visions play in the lives of those they touched (the girls, Langston, Amos, Beaulah, Anna Lee)?


There are a lot of mothers in the novel: Alice, Beulah, Anna Lee, Langston, Mary (of the visions), Grandma Wilkey. Do we see any father figures? What part does Walt play? Is Amos a father figure?


Have you ever left in the middle of something? A play, an educational experience, a concert? There are a lot of examples in the novel of leaving early--- Langston and Taos leaving the opera, Langston leaving her PhD program, Taos leaving town, Alice leaving the earth (so to speak). What is it about leaving something early that gives us such a feeling?


What is is about "seeing someone" truly? Amos finally sees Langston, Alice sees her future children in Jack's eyes.


What do you think about this idea of "ultimacy"? In a discussion of this book, the author Haven Kimmel is asked if she believes, like Amos, that people are living lives that are hopelessly broken and they know it. She says yes. Then goes on to say, "Let me put it this way. Many people who are living lives that are hopefully broken appear not to know it, because they confuse themselves with busyness or layers and layers of distraction. Think of women (and some men) who devote their lives to their children - to running them hither and yon, soccer and ballet and I don't know what all, and the cooking and the laundry, etc., - and their own inner lives make rare appearances. And then the children grow up and move away, and those women are left awake in the middle of the night, sleeping next to a man they now barely know (since their joint project has been taken away), heart's pounding, because it wasn't enough. Even Family fails to achieve Ultimacy. I guarantee you have either all heard, or will hear, the following statements as some times in your lives:
'I got everything I wanted, the money, the title, and it wasn't enough.'
'Weird how I thought everything depended on saving enough to buy that boat, and now that I have it, it isn't enough. I'm thinking of having my eyes done, just to get rid of some of these wrinkles.'
'I hate my husband.'
But I ask you honestly, have you ever, ever heard someone say, 'God simply wasn't enough,' or 'The Infinite has failed me again, so I might as well go back to drinking'? I never have." What do you think?