Happy Friday! Welcome back to the final discussion over The Scent of Rain and Lightning by Nancy Pickard! I've really enjoyed this book and I'm glad someone suggested it, or it wouldn't have made it to the top of my TBR pile for awhile!
I felt like the book ended with a lot of action, which I like, and only hurried itself through the part where Meryl is identified as the killer. I found the part where Belle identified his bow tie thingie and then immediately opened the box to be quick without her at least revealing some doubts that she'd always had of him or something. It just seemed to quick and clean. But I had guessed that Testament Rocks would eventually give Jody a clue. Funny, how she was always drawn there and that was where Laurie did die. Kinda freaky.
1. Did the identity of the killer surprise you?
2. Do you think Laurie deserved the ending she got?
3. Do the Linders ever abuse the power they have in the community?
4. What was your overall impression of Chase's character? Did he evolve?
5. How does the story reveal the challenges of forgiveness?
6. Was Meryl essentially a good man, despite his affair with Laurie and his role in Hugh-Jays's death? Can a person hide his or her true character from his or her family so successfully for so many years?Do you think Belle always wondered, which was why she was so quick to open that box? And seriously, WHY THE HELL DID MERYL KEEP IT AROUND???
7. Do you think Laurie would have matured or would she have stayed the same?
Thanks for participating!!! Come back next month! ;) If you'd like to guest post next month just let me know!
Showing posts with label the scent of rain and lightning. Show all posts
Showing posts with label the scent of rain and lightning. Show all posts
Friday, October 28, 2011
Friday, October 21, 2011
Discussion 3 - The Scent of Rain and Lightning
Hey all! Welcome back to the third discussion of The Scent of Rain and Lightning! Any and all are welcome to throw in an opinion or two!
I flew through this section. I felt so bad for Red. He obviously was falling for Jody and she was having none of it. They definitely had different views on how their relationship was going. ;) I also felt bad for Collin. He must have been so conflicted, knowing that getting his dad out of prison was the RIGHT thing to do, however bad a decision it was for everybody around them. I don't know if I could have been as nice as Collin and worked to get such an evil man out of prison.
An excerpt from the Random House interview with the author..
RHRC: You've woven two compelling stories into The Scent of Rain and Lightning. Which came to you first, the backstory or the presentday story? Did you find one easier to write than the other?
NP: I always find the backstories easier to write than the present-day stories. It's almost as if they already exist somewhere in time and space, and all I have to do is write them down; where with the present-day stories, I'm never sure what's going to happen next. This was true with Scent, it was true with Virgin, and it was true in my Marie Lightfoot series, in which my heroine, a true crime writer, was giving us chapters from her books about certain crimes and I was writing what was happening in her life currently. That's really where and when I started writing novels in this way, and I love doing it, though it's still a big writing challenge for me.
1. What do you think of everyone thinking Billy deserved prison even though they didnt think he killed Hugh-Jay?
2. How do you think Collin's life would have been different if Billy hadn't gone to prison?
3. Is it believable how quickly Jody starts accepting everyone's opinion of Billy's innocence?
4. Where do you see Jody's relationship with Red going? What do you think of Collin's confession to Jody?
5. What was the purpose of killing Val?
Come back next Friday for the last discussion through the end of the book!!! ;) Thanks for participating! Vote for November's book in the sidebar!
I flew through this section. I felt so bad for Red. He obviously was falling for Jody and she was having none of it. They definitely had different views on how their relationship was going. ;) I also felt bad for Collin. He must have been so conflicted, knowing that getting his dad out of prison was the RIGHT thing to do, however bad a decision it was for everybody around them. I don't know if I could have been as nice as Collin and worked to get such an evil man out of prison.
An excerpt from the Random House interview with the author..
RHRC: You've woven two compelling stories into The Scent of Rain and Lightning. Which came to you first, the backstory or the presentday story? Did you find one easier to write than the other?
NP: I always find the backstories easier to write than the present-day stories. It's almost as if they already exist somewhere in time and space, and all I have to do is write them down; where with the present-day stories, I'm never sure what's going to happen next. This was true with Scent, it was true with Virgin, and it was true in my Marie Lightfoot series, in which my heroine, a true crime writer, was giving us chapters from her books about certain crimes and I was writing what was happening in her life currently. That's really where and when I started writing novels in this way, and I love doing it, though it's still a big writing challenge for me.
1. What do you think of everyone thinking Billy deserved prison even though they didnt think he killed Hugh-Jay?
2. How do you think Collin's life would have been different if Billy hadn't gone to prison?
3. Is it believable how quickly Jody starts accepting everyone's opinion of Billy's innocence?
4. Where do you see Jody's relationship with Red going? What do you think of Collin's confession to Jody?
5. What was the purpose of killing Val?
Come back next Friday for the last discussion through the end of the book!!! ;) Thanks for participating! Vote for November's book in the sidebar!
Friday, October 14, 2011
Discussion 2 - The Scent of Rain and Lightning
Oh my word. The end of this section had my heart melting at how Chase calmed his niece and rid of her fear of storms. It almost took away the thought of him flirting inappropriately with his brother's wife.
I feel like I am too cynical for this book. I keep wanting someone to say WHERE THE HELL IS LAURIE? DID SHE KILL HUGH-JAY? Did she run away? Cuz, just accepting that Billy killed her? Come on people, get interesting.
I will say that it hooked me and has me interested. Except for when they start mentioning the landscape, but I think I've established before, I don't do descriptions. Just tell me what's going on and give me dialogue!
1. Do you like the scent of rain?
2. Who do you think killed Hugh-Jay based on the clues so far?
3. If you were one of the Linder children, how would you feel about the way the parent's seem to treat their children?
4. What do you think of the relationships the siblings have in the Linder family?
5. What is your impression of Belle?
Thanks for participating! Come back next Friday to discuss chapters 21-32!
I feel like I am too cynical for this book. I keep wanting someone to say WHERE THE HELL IS LAURIE? DID SHE KILL HUGH-JAY? Did she run away? Cuz, just accepting that Billy killed her? Come on people, get interesting.
I will say that it hooked me and has me interested. Except for when they start mentioning the landscape, but I think I've established before, I don't do descriptions. Just tell me what's going on and give me dialogue!
1. Do you like the scent of rain?
2. Who do you think killed Hugh-Jay based on the clues so far?
3. If you were one of the Linder children, how would you feel about the way the parent's seem to treat their children?
4. What do you think of the relationships the siblings have in the Linder family?
5. What is your impression of Belle?
Thanks for participating! Come back next Friday to discuss chapters 21-32!
Friday, October 7, 2011
The Scent of Rain and Lightning - Discussion 1
Happy Friday!!!! Welcome to any newbies and any oldies to the Friday book talk!
I will be honest, when I started out reading the first chapter I was like oooooh man, this is a lot of wordy descriptions of people and I am going to shoot myself. Then it picked up. I flew through chapters 2-10.
I get the impression that if Annabelle and Hugh were my parents or in my town I'd find them presumptuous, annoying and meddling. For reals.
And oh my gosh.. That poor cow! We live across the road from a farm and every fall when they move the cows and calves it's so sad. The mama cows cry so loud for their calves for like 4 days! The first two days it is 24/7 non-stop. I hope it doesn't make me cry for real this year. Speaking of, it should probably be happening this weekend or next.
Blurb from author interview:
Random House Readers Circle: How did the idea for this story come about?
Nancy Pickard: It started with the landscape. I saw a photograph of Monument Rocks in Gove County, Kansas, and it blew me away. Since then, I’ve been out there to see them. They are so unexpected, so enormous, so beautiful, and they’re such a dramatic contrast to the ultraflat ground from which they rise. Even from seeing only a photo, I sensed I had to set a story there. (In the novel, I renamed them Testament Rocks.)
RHRC: Many reviewers have raved about your ability to make Kansas come alive in this book and your previous book. The setting for The Scent of Rain and Lightning is very different from the one you used in The Virgin of Small Plains. How do you choose the settings and landscapes for your stories?
NP: I think they choose me. Something about a landscape will grab me and haunt me. It won’t let go until it has its very own book! Currently I’m working on a book set in the farthest corner of southeastern Kansas, and for a long time I couldn’t figure out why I felt such a compulsion to write about it. It doesn’t have the gorgeous expansive landscape of Virgin or the surprising, spectacular landscape of Scent, so what was pulling me toward it? I finally realized that the landscape under its ground is as interesting as any landscape above ground in other places.
1. Have you read anything else by Nancy Pickard? What was it? Would you recommend it?
2. What role does weather have in the novel?
3. Have you ever been to a ranch?
4. Do you think Laurie is having an affair or just flirting at this point? Who do you think she is having an affair with? (if you've already finished, you can put who you thought as you read)
5. Do you ever keep forgetting that the book is placed in Kansas and not Texas?
6. What is your first impression of the characters so far? (Annabelle, Hugh, Hugh-Jay, Chase, Bobby, Billy Crosby, Laurie, Belle, Jody, Val, Collin etc.. )
Thanks for participating! Come back next week for Discussion 2 over chapters 12-20!
I will be honest, when I started out reading the first chapter I was like oooooh man, this is a lot of wordy descriptions of people and I am going to shoot myself. Then it picked up. I flew through chapters 2-10.
I get the impression that if Annabelle and Hugh were my parents or in my town I'd find them presumptuous, annoying and meddling. For reals.
And oh my gosh.. That poor cow! We live across the road from a farm and every fall when they move the cows and calves it's so sad. The mama cows cry so loud for their calves for like 4 days! The first two days it is 24/7 non-stop. I hope it doesn't make me cry for real this year. Speaking of, it should probably be happening this weekend or next.
Blurb from author interview:
Random House Readers Circle: How did the idea for this story come about?
Nancy Pickard: It started with the landscape. I saw a photograph of Monument Rocks in Gove County, Kansas, and it blew me away. Since then, I’ve been out there to see them. They are so unexpected, so enormous, so beautiful, and they’re such a dramatic contrast to the ultraflat ground from which they rise. Even from seeing only a photo, I sensed I had to set a story there. (In the novel, I renamed them Testament Rocks.)
RHRC: Many reviewers have raved about your ability to make Kansas come alive in this book and your previous book. The setting for The Scent of Rain and Lightning is very different from the one you used in The Virgin of Small Plains. How do you choose the settings and landscapes for your stories?
NP: I think they choose me. Something about a landscape will grab me and haunt me. It won’t let go until it has its very own book! Currently I’m working on a book set in the farthest corner of southeastern Kansas, and for a long time I couldn’t figure out why I felt such a compulsion to write about it. It doesn’t have the gorgeous expansive landscape of Virgin or the surprising, spectacular landscape of Scent, so what was pulling me toward it? I finally realized that the landscape under its ground is as interesting as any landscape above ground in other places.
1. Have you read anything else by Nancy Pickard? What was it? Would you recommend it?
2. What role does weather have in the novel?
3. Have you ever been to a ranch?
4. Do you think Laurie is having an affair or just flirting at this point? Who do you think she is having an affair with? (if you've already finished, you can put who you thought as you read)
5. Do you ever keep forgetting that the book is placed in Kansas and not Texas?
6. What is your first impression of the characters so far? (Annabelle, Hugh, Hugh-Jay, Chase, Bobby, Billy Crosby, Laurie, Belle, Jody, Val, Collin etc.. )
Thanks for participating! Come back next week for Discussion 2 over chapters 12-20!
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
October's Group Read!
The Scent of Rain and Lightning by Nancy Pickard!!
About:
One beautiful summer afternoon, from her bedroom window on the second floor, Jody Linder is unnerved to see her three uncles parking their pickups in front of her parents’ house—or what she calls her parents’ house, even though Jay and Laurie Jo Linder have been gone almost all of Jody’s life. “What is this fearsome thing I see?” the young high school English teacher whispers, mimicking Shakespeare. Polished boots, pressed jeans, fresh white shirts, Stetsons—her uncles’ suspiciously clean visiting clothes are a disturbing sign.
The three bring shocking news: The man convicted of murdering Jody’s father is being released from prison and returning to the small town of Rose, Kansas. It has been twenty-six years since that stormy night when, as baby Jody lay asleep in her crib, her father was shot and killed and her mother disappeared, presumed dead. Neither the protective embrace of Jody’s uncles nor the safe haven of her grandparents’ ranch could erase the pain caused by Billy Crosby on that catastrophic night.
Now Billy Crosby has been granted a new trial, thanks in large part to the efforts of his son, Collin, a lawyer who has spent most of his life trying to prove his father’s innocence. As Jody lives only a few doors down from the Crosbys, she knows that sooner or later she’ll come face-to-face with the man who she believes destroyed her family.
What she doesn’t expect are the heated exchanges with Collin. Having grown up practically side by side in this very small town, Jody and Collin have had a long history of carefully avoiding each other’s eyes. Now Jody discovers that underneath their antagonism is a shared sense of loss that no one else could possibly understand. As she revisits old wounds, startling revelations compel her to uncover the dangerous truth about her family’s tragic past.
Engrossing, lyrical, and suspenseful, The Scent of Rain and Lightning captures the essence of small-town America—its heartfelt intimacy and its darkest secrets—where through struggle and hardship people still dare to hope for a better future. For Jody Linder, maybe even love.
I do have to apologize, for getting the poll up late and then I realized I messed up making it. Sorry! It's been VERY hectic around these parts with working and a 4 month old. Who woulda thunk it? Here is the line up for discussion.. Thanks to Amber for splitting it up. My copy from Amazon won't be here til tomorrow!
Discussion 1 - pages 1-80 (chapter 1-11) October 7th
Discussion 2 - pages 81-160 (chapters 12-20) October 14th
Discussion 3 - pages 161-240 (chapters 21-32) October 21st
Discussion 4 - pages 241-319 (chapters 33-44) October 28th
If you would like to do a guest post for one of the days, just let me know!! Who is joining in this month?
One beautiful summer afternoon, from her bedroom window on the second floor, Jody Linder is unnerved to see her three uncles parking their pickups in front of her parents’ house—or what she calls her parents’ house, even though Jay and Laurie Jo Linder have been gone almost all of Jody’s life. “What is this fearsome thing I see?” the young high school English teacher whispers, mimicking Shakespeare. Polished boots, pressed jeans, fresh white shirts, Stetsons—her uncles’ suspiciously clean visiting clothes are a disturbing sign.
The three bring shocking news: The man convicted of murdering Jody’s father is being released from prison and returning to the small town of Rose, Kansas. It has been twenty-six years since that stormy night when, as baby Jody lay asleep in her crib, her father was shot and killed and her mother disappeared, presumed dead. Neither the protective embrace of Jody’s uncles nor the safe haven of her grandparents’ ranch could erase the pain caused by Billy Crosby on that catastrophic night.
Now Billy Crosby has been granted a new trial, thanks in large part to the efforts of his son, Collin, a lawyer who has spent most of his life trying to prove his father’s innocence. As Jody lives only a few doors down from the Crosbys, she knows that sooner or later she’ll come face-to-face with the man who she believes destroyed her family.
What she doesn’t expect are the heated exchanges with Collin. Having grown up practically side by side in this very small town, Jody and Collin have had a long history of carefully avoiding each other’s eyes. Now Jody discovers that underneath their antagonism is a shared sense of loss that no one else could possibly understand. As she revisits old wounds, startling revelations compel her to uncover the dangerous truth about her family’s tragic past.
Engrossing, lyrical, and suspenseful, The Scent of Rain and Lightning captures the essence of small-town America—its heartfelt intimacy and its darkest secrets—where through struggle and hardship people still dare to hope for a better future. For Jody Linder, maybe even love.
I do have to apologize, for getting the poll up late and then I realized I messed up making it. Sorry! It's been VERY hectic around these parts with working and a 4 month old. Who woulda thunk it? Here is the line up for discussion.. Thanks to Amber for splitting it up. My copy from Amazon won't be here til tomorrow!
Discussion 1 - pages 1-80 (chapter 1-11) October 7th
Discussion 2 - pages 81-160 (chapters 12-20) October 14th
Discussion 3 - pages 161-240 (chapters 21-32) October 21st
Discussion 4 - pages 241-319 (chapters 33-44) October 28th
If you would like to do a guest post for one of the days, just let me know!! Who is joining in this month?
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