I need to get the book...but here if the general thread if you've read it all...if people want every weeks' breakdown, does anyone mind making one and posting it? And then I'll post all the weeks at once so you can post where you are at...if that makes sense.

If not, here is this! I'm going to try and get the book from the library soon...sorry!!

Okay...well, I finished this morning, but I decided I'll just create a breakdown for now.

I don't know, so here's my try:
Week 1- Chapters 1-4 (Pages 1-96)
Week 2- Chapters 5-9 (Pages 97-164)
Week 3- Chapters 10-13 (Pages 165-237)
Week 4- Chapters 14-17 (Pages 238- 290)
Week 5- Chapters 18- End(Pages 291- 341)

That may be kind of long, so I could try to make it to four weeks if you want.

new book!
I'll try to get it asap

Hi Karina! I'm glad you'll be reading along with us. Feel free to share your thoughts. Lauren is my friend

Lynn - Thanks for the breakdown! You picked another great book!!!

I'm really enjoying this book. First off let me share my theory after reading the first two chapters. I think Naomi planned the whole thing from the beginning. She targeted Carole as her victim. I think she and Eddie are gonna blackmail her for money. But of course that hasn't happened yet, it's just a theory on my part based on the way Naomi friended her and then planned the whole thing with Eddie. I just got a ickie feeling about it right off. And he's an actor. And why wasn't Naomi freaking out. She was so calm during the whole drag the body to the woods scene. It seemed plotted out. And she never defended her friend in any way. She was just like "eh whatever" The crime scene was so sloppy too. Carole wore Rita's boots. Ewww gross. and they just left her in the snow. like duh, someone will find her eventually. then the wallet being in the snow parka, too convenient, obviously planted there. And the room was in Carole's name. And a car drove by in the middle of the night when Carole was walking from the woods. Also Naomi had Carole meet Eddie in that very public place with all those witnesses. Plus they said that Eddie had been to that place in Stowe many times, like he scoped it out. Just too much evidence, too planned out for me.

The way Rita died was confusing. I don't think the author described it very well. I read it twice and still didn't get a good visual of how it actually happened. idk I don't think we are supposed to know clearly. I think we are supposed to be in Carole's shoes, blurry and not remembering a lot of details about how it happened.

Also, who was Rita? Did she really die? Maybe she was an actress too. If they did kill her on purpose to frame Carole, why did they want her dead? Was it simply to blackmail Carole for money? There are a lot of sloppy questions and my guess is the author did this intentionally.

I really liked the way Carole discovered lying was easy. "It was amazing how easily you could fit lies into the truth and the truth into lies." So true.

I also liked it when she was having a normal conversation but then you'd see her thoughts "I killed a woman."
"Her name was Rita."
"I'm a very big girl. Three hot dogs a night. I broke her neck."
"She must be frozen solid by now"

I'm worried about her sleeping and the pills. I was glad her mother found them. I understand the wanting it all to go away and having a plan with the pills so that if the police did start asking questions she had a way out. But still.. i don't think suicide is the answer. I did think it was interesting how she wanted a plan. the thought of suicide was relief, freedom.

And what's the deal with Eddie talking to Carole's mom, again another clue that the whole thing is planned. He's toying with her. They are just setting her up. Thank god she realizes she can't trust Naomi. I was glad she stayed away from her. Interesting that Naomi "reconnected" with the other girls at school. How convenient.

I hated the way Eddie treated Carole. The way he made her feel like it was her fault. The way he made her doubt her own memories. "She could not remember Rita's neck at all, even though that was exactly the thing she had to remember." It's almost like they performed a magic trick and Carole was just the audience. I'm not convinced that Rita is dead. Ooooh and then when he said "You know you did this. And it can be proved." So threatening. Also like he holds some cards that she doesn't know about. How can it be proved? What does he know? What can he tell police that Carole doesn't remember? And when he got her to say out loud "I killed her" I was thinking maybe he was taping it or something. He was leading her so carefully into saying it.

I'm not sure how the whole Rachel having a baby thing ties into this. Except that maybe Rachel will turn out to be a friend Carole can confide in and get help from. She seems like a smart cookie. Carole needs a friend like that.

I was shocked at how openly Naomi and Carole argued about things at school. The one teacher said they could be heard and here they were talking about Rita. OMG good girl Carole for saying "it was all a setup." stupid Naomi saying "maybe I did. maybe I didn't." wow what a great friend. Then her comment "I'm bloddy glad. I like being the one not in trouble for once, if you must know. And I like it that you are!" Oops I think that's in chapter 5... sorry I'll stop now.

Just a few quotes I liked:

I laughed when Carole's father said she was gonna be "a handsome woman" ha ha Panic reference.

"Her mother always said if the cure didn't hurt, it wasn't a cure."

"The body creates all new cells every seven years. At some point there wouldn't be a single cell in her that was there right now. Already there were new ones forming. Old ones dying and falling away. Already she was becoming someone else." Brilliant!!! I wonder if it's true.

So what do you guys think? Enjoying it? Do you want to see Carole triumph and burie Eddie and Naomi? Or do you think Carole should take the fall?

Sorry for the typo's I was in a hurry and no spell check...

omg, there's a new book! i must try to get it...and actually discuss this time...sorry about that...

okay so i finished the book yesterday but i remember my predictions at the beginning and i won't give away if they're right or wrong. but just for the record i said that naomi was too stupid to be in on it. which is unusual for me because i don't like to underestimate people or write them off but i'm just getting major stupidity vibes off of her. it's really weird that she came into the room and didn't even care that there was a dead woman there or how it happened or anything but she feels like the type of person who would accept what eddie tells her and she just didn't care because it doesn't concern her at all.

quote:

Originally posted by Gunslingirl:
It's almost like they performed a magic trick and Carole was just the audience.

very well put, omg.
i think it was supposed to be choppy like that because carole really doesn't have a clear idea of what happened and she was drunk and everything but i really hated that scene. it was frustrating to read-i still can't see how rita died but you know there's definitely something up with that and eddie is using it to plant memories in her head.

eddie. ugh. i hate eddie. he has some serious issues with women. and he's such an asshole. it makes me so sad that she lets him get away with talking to her like that. for the little bit of charm he gets to abuse her so much, calling her fatcakes and everything. it's horrible. it's disgusting. i'm really disappointed that she didn't just leave.

why don't you think that rita is really dead? that's an interesting question you raise, especially because most people would just accept it unquestioningly. or at least i would.

the cells thing is true btw.

the whole naomi fall-out is suspicious too. it makes me so angry at her. and the part where she said that she's glad that carole's the one in trouble says a lot about her. i want her and eddie to take the fall and carole to get off free. especially the way eddie is manipulating her. sheesh, it's so sad. especially how this girl who's supposed to be so smart just has no clue what to do and isn't thinking clearly about this.

annie and karina: hey. can't wait to discuss with you guys!

Eddie planting memories – I completely agree!

Eddie is an ass – and his fake compliments in the beginning to lure her into trusting him make it even worse!

Why don’t you think that Rita is really dead? – I guess in a suspense novel like this I’m looking for a twist. expecting something radical. Plus as a writer you want to be clear about events and you emphasis what you want the reader to know but the way she wrote that murder scene was too vague and I think she was intentionally unclear about all the details.

I liked how her mom (and dad) worried about her and saw right away that she’d changed. I was glad to see that they really love her and that they KNOW her. You know, like some parents don’t know their kids, but they do which of course will make it all even more dramatic when they find out about what really happened that weekend.

PART 2 - Chapters 5 - 9

I didn't expect this book to go this way. Carole isloating herself and running away. I guess I thought it would be the three of them battling and black mailing each other but there really hasn't been too much of that. Certainly not enough for my theory that they tricked her to hold water. It seems the book is more about lying and hiding than anything else. How can someone spend their whole life hiding and not really living? Poor Carole I want her to be happy but she seems to have just shut herself off.

I liked Jeremy. He was sweet and safe and he introduced her to exploring the real world. If it hadn't been for him she could never have picked up and left. So I'm thankful for that. I hate that he turned out to be gay and I hate that he used her as his disguise.

Another confrontation with Eddie. I hate how he manipulates her memories and tries to tell her she doesn't know what happened. He's such an ass with his threats. I like that she recognizes that he doesn't do it with men, only women.

I liked Carole's assertiveness with her roommate, telling her she wanted the desk. I was so surprised when she left. I didn't see that coming. But her parents not looking for her, I didn't expect that either. Why not? And then her mother died. That was very hard for me to read. I thought the author did a wonderful job expressing Carole's pain. Her poor lonely father. All three of them were just shells, not really living the life they wanted. Her father tried. I thought it was nice that he asked her to stay. Pleaded really. But of course she couldn't. Stupid Eddie showing up and saying all that stuff about her mom. Gross. Who wants to know that? And at her funeral.

"There was no fighting off the memory of Rita now, no avoiding the awful sloppy laxity of her body, the way it had slipped and slithered like a huge wet doll, how hard to hold onto. How different that had been from this prim form that had been her mother." oooooh once again suggesting Rita did not die. hmmm where is the author going with this? idk.

Quotes I liked:

"Apparently the truth went every which way. Apparently the truth was nothing special."

"The Plum, is the truth people tell at a point when they think they have no other alternatives. It comes after skillful questioning by an attorney, a building, if ou will, of questions or statements, one upon the other so that the person thinks you already know the truth and simply blurts it out in corroboration."

"Everybody's good at being rich. It's poverty that's hard."

"It took way more time to be ready than it did to do the actual work."

*crickets* ok, i'm moving forward. come on Stephanie, i know you can comment cause you finished the book.

Part Three - Chapters 10 - 13

Whoa skip 10 years forward and Carole's in Vermont, owns a restaurant and living with Will. Hmmm it's interesting to me how the author picks and chooses what events have lots of details and what events have none. for instance her mother dying, lots of detail, her father dying no details.

I like that she's settled down and created her own little family along side Rachel. And I'm glad to see that she's a successful business woman.

Oh poor pepper and the scar. Eddie, bad Eddie, wish he'd die in the war. whenever the author brings him back bad stuff happens. I thought they did a good job describing San Fransisco during that time, especially their hatred for vets coming back from vietnam.

I don't understand why Naomi would want to go out to live in the country. it doesn't suit her at all and she's not really running.

"Her whole life it seemed was about hiding and runing and close calls." this made me sad because it's true. I wonder what her life would have been like if she had told authorities.

Ah ha, looking through pictures for the menu and saw "a nude woman lying facedown in a clearing, arms outstreched and toes pointed in." Carole says "she's dead" and he says "no she's not" she was sunbathing. Again. is rita really dead? i'm still don't believe it.

The time has come, Carole must go back and look, investigate and find answers.... oh boy, the reader can get answers too. "that she would go back to look had been ordained the day Rita Boudreau died, a given fact of her life." police say that most criminals go back to the scene of the crime. haunted the mom did.

oh shit, the woods are gone and it's a golf course. wtf why would anyone care if she were walking around there. stupid lady telling her to "stay away."

"she felt sometimes that she had a million fragmented identities, as though she was only a filament of reality." i liked that quote.

And I loved this analogy: "paint what you see and not what you know. Looking fully at an object and not thinking 'flower' or 'shoe' or whatever it was but concentrating only on line, shadow and color. the teacher would stand behind her and say 'where do you see that?' and of course it wasn't there." wow. again, like magic, rita wasn't really dead.

oh why does she have to go to rita's apartment. she's being very reckless after years and years of being safe. "she'd spent all these years taming her impulses, only to give in to them and then take those awful risks." that boy running the pharmacy was a little creepy.

OHHHHHH DAMN. Rita IS dead. OK, so I was wrong about that whole thing. I hope he doesn't turn her in. I'm sure he could describe her to police. Oh, Carole, what ARE you doing???

wow, okay so apparently i missed a lot because oh hell, i was supposed to get this done by sunday and i suck because i'm never around my book. so here's what i have to say in no particular order i guess. well okay, that's a lie. i'll do responses first and then see what i can scare up in terms of my own thoughts.

i'm not sure if her parents really knew her. it's like they underestimated her. they expected her to just follow their plans and she didn't and then things just completely went south. she couldn't really talk to them at all, it was just impositions and what they expected of her. such a sad relationship there. i felt so bad for her father when he came to find her after her mother died. and there's one more thing i have to say about that matter but i won't because it's later on in the book. i feel so bad for her mother too and i refuse to believe what eddie said about her. he paints her as this desperate and pathetic woman and he just used the entire family...ugh he makes me so angry! "Women were eddie lindbaeck's domain, people smaller and weaker than he was." boy has some serious issues.

carole runs away a lot. for the majority of the story. which i can understand but after a while it's just so freaking infuriating. i started marking up the book and all over the place i'm writing "TELL SOMEONE ALREADY!" jesus christ, way to bottle things up. but i feel like if she just told someone she would feel so much better and everything would be solved. i guess i can admire her for keeping so quiet about it. i know that there would be a best friend or 6 that i would have to end up telling because i wouldn't be able to handle all of that pressure by myself.

i really liked jeremy. i was so sad that he turned out to be gay because i kind of wanted them to get together and for him to fix all her problems and for them to live happily ever after. i was hoping that he'd be the one to really like her when no one else really accepted her. and then there was that moment that she was going to tell him and she didn't and i was really pissed off. it's funny though because i don't really think he did something that horrible to her and i was kind of shocked that she got so upset. i mean, telling his parents that he was nailing her was pretty crude and uncalled for but i didn't see anything really bad in being his cover. it's funny how she learns so much about the truth and still she's just so naive.

the fight with her roommate was brilliant. i was so proud. i wish she applied that assertiveness everywhere, or at least used it in other situations where it was desperately needed. i was kind of shocked that she ran away from school though. i guess that it was never what she really wanted to do and she wasn't happy there but on the other hand it makes me sad that eddie has derailed her life so much and forced her to go into hiding.

oh and you know i loved the quote "Everybody's good at being rich. It's poverty that's hard." even though i don't necessarily agree. she had money. naomi had money. and i wouldn't describe either of them as happy or having an easy life. i do agree with the other quote you posted though. "It took way more time to be ready than it did to do the actual work."

the next part skips ahead very suddenly and i didn't like it. some parts in the book are very disjointed and frustrating. they come completely out of nowhere and then stop right in the middle of a good story. oh, her father didn't die. she lied about that to will. which i think is absolutely horrible to say about one of your family members.

omg i love pepper so much. i feel bad for him because i think rachel is a crappy mom. the poor boy needs some attention and love and consistency in his life and she's just leaving him to raise himself. but when he kicked eddie there was definitely a little 'you go boy' on my part even though i knew it was a very foolish thing for him to do. and once again carole sees exactly how dangerous eddie is-how he would just attack a child like that and she just continues to hide her head in the sand. it kills me. you can practically hear the bad guy music every time he comes into the story.

rachel's little intervention group pisses me off too because excuse me, where are you when this boy needs a mother? you pass him off onto carole like he's her responsibility. and maybe it's not so wise to pick fights with unknown men with your little son around. honestly! i liked morgan a lot better in that whole thing and i didn't realize that they had actually gotten married until the end of the book. i was really happy that they were leaving but obviously eddie is going to find them again because that's just what he does. i thought it was really funny that carole would be so agreeable to vermont though. and i was kind of impressed that they could live such an outdoorsy life like that because it sounded rough.

oh, i didn't understand the whole naomi thing either. well, i did a little later on based on something that she said but that came toward the end of the book and i'll save it for then. remind me though.

quote:

I wonder what her life would have been like if she had told authorities.

i don't think that telling the authorities after the incident would have been good for her because eddie had already planted the memories and she probably would have went down as the murderer or an accomplice. but goddamn it, just talk to someone and have them help you figure things out!

the whole visit to the crime scene was very suspenseful. it felt symbolic that time has gone by and it's now a happy little golf course (and way to have a breakdown on it). i don't understand why she went back but i guess that line from haunted was right-they always have to go back and talk about it. it was a pretty unwise move because she was very suspicious and that guy knew something was up. lol at Howie giving her the finger.

quote:

"she felt sometimes that she had a million fragmented identities, as though she was only a filament of reality."

it's really true. she was never really able to be anyone or anything. there was always hiding and fear. and she could never really open up about herself because she was so afraid of revealing that secret to anyone. she is her job. "Everything efficient and clean, the opposite of her own life. All that order was something to aspire to. Imagine being so busy with your work that you didn't have a minute to think."

i don't know why, i always took rita being dead at face value. although that would have been a very sick and interesting twist. and then they would have all been playing her to get the money. well haha, like one of my highlighted quotes says, "it amazed her what people just automatically believed."

so let's see if there's anything else i can add from my book now.

here's a quote that came from the very same passage as 'apparently the truth was nothing special' but i feel like it fits the theme of the book. "When they found out, it didn't matter to them who had made the mess. They'd punished the sleeping boy in their bed when he'd had less to do with it than anyone."

OH! when i read this it just seemed like a random thing but something wasn't right here. i'm going to type the whole thing and it's a bit long. "He'd raised his hand to her shoulder and was running his thumb up and down her neck. It made her think of that night, when he'd checked for Rita's pulse. 'Relax, will you? You're too uptight. I'm not going to hurt you. I just wondered-" His thumb stopped moving and pressed lightly just above her collarbone. 'I heard this makes you orgasm better. You ever hear that?'...Eddie sat back and sighed. 'Yeah,' he said. 'I didn't think it was true either. It's crazy. That's what I thought when I heard it. Shark fins, tiger balls. All just a lot of superstition. I just wondered if you'd ever heard that.'" sent up a small red flag when i read it.

oh and lol so hard at working at a place called Magnolia Thunderpussy.

i think that's it. and i think a celebration is in order for this post finally being finished.

“TELL SOMEONE ALREADY!” Although I understand your sentiment here, I have to say there are some things that you “take to the grave” and I think this is one of them. but in order to do that you have to let it go too. that’s the only way you can clear your own conscious of it and live a happy life. which she never did.

It thought the significance of gay jeremy’s lies was just that she didn’t want to be part of someone else’s cover up. it was as if she was dragged into his life under false pretenses and she can’t handle betrayal of any sort.

LOL that made me think, Brady and I were watching skating videos and there was one that said “inline skating vs. gays on trays” LOL!! apparently inline skaters are a billion times cooler than sk8boarders. sorry, I now return you to your regularly scheduled program.

Oh, her father hasn’t died. interesting, so he just moved and she assumed he died. got it.

Can you cast this movie for me?? because I can’t imagine what Eddie looks like and what Carole and Naomi look like and I was trying to think what actors would play them but I couldn’t come up with anyone.

telling authorities: except she wouldn’t have been charged with murder because there was no intent. it would have been manslaughter. she probably could have served 10 years and been done with it, and that’s only if it went to trial. with her dad’s money and fancy lawyers they probably could have plea bargained down to 5 years or something. Regardless, it wouldn’t have been her entire life.

“she was never really able to be anyone or anyting” or really live.

O.M.G. I didn’t even catch the whole “I heard this makes you orgasm better” thing. So you think he was actually confessing here? Like that’s how he killed her, he was pressing on her throat to give her a better orgasm? Hmmmmm

I laughed at the Thunderpussy too, of course!!

I finished the book and so instead of doing two write-ups I thought I’d just post one, since no one else is reading *crickets* and Stephanie is already finished.

So the author left all the good stuff for the last 50 pages. I guess that’s pretty typical in a suspense novel.

Leave it to Naomi to make you have to run the vacuum cleaner after opening the mail. ha ha ha ha ha ha sounds like some ppl I know.

“and no doubt lace their story with lies, or worse, the truth.” da da dum dum. I liked that because sometimes the truth IS worse than a lie. Isn’t that why people lie in the first place because they don’t like the truth?

I thought it was very revealing when Naomi tore up her parents apartment after the party, showed that her parents never paid attention to her and showed that she didn’t care about money or belongings. I was glad Carole didn’t participate too much.

I thought it was interesting the author threw in a new best friend Zoe but it ended up being completely meaningless to the story, just something to fill the pages.

I loved that Will called her ‘cha’

“we have the kind of secret that – how can I put this? It’s useful. You’re so scared all the time. And to tell you the truth, it’s fun.” he’s just toying with her. he likes to watch her squirm. he’s such a dick.

I thought Rachel over-reacted just a little about Eddie once she realized who he was. I guess she had a lot of resentment that Carole was keeping a secret too because I didn’t really understand how she just decided that was the “last straw”

And to take the baby on that night hike, how stupid is that? I knew right away they’d have to stop because of the baby, that’s the only reason the author would write that in there.

“He was crazy. She’d always known it. He was missing something. A conscience. that was it. He wasn’t all there.” Yup that about sums Eddie up. empty, no guilt, no shame, no responsibility.

I didn’t think it fit when the author brought back her dad and his new wife “Gloria”. Even at the end of the book I still just felt like it was page filler and didn’t connect with the story much. I liked how he wrote her and said “you did little to erase yourself.” when she thought she had done such a good job. she felt that way because no one looked for her. just like no one looked for Rita. then Carole was upset that he was spying “all this time, somebody had been watching.” she didn’t see it as him loving her and wanting to know she was safe.

I love Will. I was really hoping he’d turn out to be a good guy, someone she could trust.

I was pleasantly surprised the picture turned up on the menu game. although I guess I could have pieced that together by the sunbathing picture. still, to have it revealed in such a public place was very daring for the author.

I liked how she thought “oh, but they did” (bury her) and then she couldn’t recall if she had said it out loud. Reading that whole section in the restaurant was so entertaining.

“Rita wasn’t important enough for them to make the effort. The sheriff and everybody else had let it drop.” only Carole held on to it.

“Nobody had gone looking for Rita. And that knowledge mingled unpleasantly with Carole’s own relief that she had been protected by exactly that. Rita’s anonymity and the lack of urgency into solving her death had allowed Carole to live freely all these years.” well first, she didn’t live freely and second she became anonymous herself, well tried to anyway. it was an interesting trade.

“It all came at once, the way they said your life flashed before your eyes when you died.” Yes, she was putting to rest this very old secret. by revealing it she was finally releasing it from her life.

I loved the way Eddie kept saying “wait, I don’t understand.” and he walked her through the whole thing.

Yup and you were right Stephanie about the whole ‘garrote’ did you know that from the conversation in the car or had you finished and realized after?

“It was as though the monster had finally broken through the gluey murk with its sickening, familiar fragmented images, and now, in all its brilliant and steely clarity, was what she’d really done…. She had not killed Rita Boudreau, and all these years she’d thought their knowledge, Eddie and Naomi’s, was her problem, when the truth was, she was theirs.”

As soon as she left the cottage in a rage I knew it would be death for some of the three. I figured this book wasn’t going to end in an arrest or trail or anything like that. No justice for Rita would be served by the other victims, Carole, to be exact. Plus the author wrote Eddie in a way that no one would possibly question whether it was right or not to kill him, accidental or intentional. I was glad he lived and suffered and knew he was going to die. I’m sure he had some good qualities but the author never showed them to us so I think she wanted us to cheer for his death.

Likewise, with Naomi, we were never really sure whose side she was on so it was iffy whether or not we thought she should live. So her death was a little more drawn out… but I think it’s better she died, she didn’t have much to live for anyway. it’s not like she was going to re-habilitate her life or anything. although I guess she was young enough that anything is possible. ok, so now I kinda wish she had lived and gotten the chance to start over.

who’s the most important person in a rescue? If someone is going to die, it’s got to be the victim, not you. Because if you die, the victim is going to die. Two instead of one. simple arithmetic. I didn’t catch on about Eddie’s survival training, a tidbit that I missed I guess. but it came in handy for the author to explain everything that happened. which she did in much greater detail than she described Rita’s death in the beginning of the book.

“she had finally opted for Carole after all, the way Carole, in the end, had tried to save Naomi’s life.” I was glad that Naomi ended up being in the dark like Carole but at the same time that should could blindly believe Eddie and not see how horrible he is, it’s hard to imagine anyone being that stupid.

“She’d held that secret for so long, it had become her life – the strongest facet of her personality, with everything else in service to it.”

I loved it when Will said ”Maybe I was just part of the disguise.” just like she was part of gay Jeremy’s disguise. But of course Carole didn’t see that.

Yay! I wanted to cheer when Will said “I’m not going to leave.” As far as I was concerned that was the end of the book. I didn’t need any of that stuff with her dad and Gloria.

“Neither had she understood the power of the secret she was keeping. She’d had no idea that a secret could grow with such speed and intensity, coloring all her decisions, governing her life.” I didn’t care for this spoon feeding the author’s plot to me in the last two paragraphs. I felt like it was a summary or something, like this author is so used to writing thesis statements where you have to bring everything together at the end. No, the book would have been much much better if it ended when Will said he wasn’t leaving.

“To be loved is to be known fully. To be known and still to be loved.” idk I thought the author put this in as an afterthought because I didn’t think she did a very good job describing Carole as someone who longed to be known, who longed to be loved. she was just running. if the author was trying to convey this as a theme, she did a poor job in my opinion.

My book had some reading group guide questions I thought were very dull and contrived. But I enjoyed the author’s note which she describes her concept exactly (I’m paraphrasing):

I once read that a child’s first successful lie is an important and necessary development step. …. which means we all know that uneasy mix of victory and remorse that comes with fibbing. So, knowing this, I wanted to write a story that would exaggerate certain elements. A secret and it’s network of lies, horrendous, immense and nearly unbearable, a protagonist untested by life, two other people both unpredictable and unstable, poised to come back into her life at any time to expose her.

Ah, I'll just pick up with the ending and post everything I can think of.

Okay, the end blew my mind. I realized reading over a bit from the week 4 that the tree thing is mentioned earlier, but didn't realize it would be in the end. Also how Eddie and Naomi didn't tell Carole was just sick.

I still don't like Naomi, especially because she kept the whole thing a secret. I mean, come on, Carole was you best friend, and you let her live with that for years.

I liked how the picture was on the menu, and how it kind of wrapped everything up - Will helped put the pieces together and helped to show how it was Eddie.

Will is just awesome all around. I mean, he makes Carole happy, which is good, but he also helped in other ways. He helped save her life with his nature survival things (The tree thing, the snowshoe thing) and also helped release the guilt from Carole's heart. I like him.

Oh, and I'm glad Carole left Eddie to just die. He totally deserved it. And how the last words he heard were Rita's full name. It was like, total payback, with a side of ha!

Oh, and going way back. I really like Rachael and Pepper, and their whole family. I thought it was nice that through the whole thing, she had a friend with her - even if she didn't know about the whole Rita thing and all of Carole's past. And I thought it was cute that she would have named the baby Carole if it was a girl, even if they didn't know each other. It kind of foreshadowed how close they would be in the end.

Yeah. I think I'll go back and add more detail later, that' just some really quick thoughts.

okay so i'll do the response thing and then i'll tear my butt away from the couch (and my eyes away from the price is right) to get my book and add a few things.

denise: hmm idk. maybe it's just me-i'm not very good at holding my own secrets (not that i have anything deep and dark) and i'm a firm believer in talking it out because it makes you feel so much better. so i's probably have to tell someone, even if the only person who ever knew was my sister or nicole or my mom or something. but i guess it says something about carole's life that she didn't have a close relationship like that. you know, like those little friendship poems that are like 'if you kill someone i'd grab the shovel.' but also because the book started to drag after a while and obviously she wasn't getting over it and i was just getting annoyed.

lol 'gays on trays.' it took me a while to figure out what that meant. i thought it was some sexual thing and i was trying to figure out what it could possibly be.

hmm casting the movie...i can't really picture carole. like i guess i have an idea of her in my mind but it's not something i can describe. she's just kind of there, but nothing remarkable. eddie is kind of muscular, dark hair, tall and hot but he has this sort of sneaky thing where he just slinks in and out whenever. and idk, naomi is kind of like a victoria beckham, cartoon character person. way too skinny and angular and tall but in a ridiculous way like in a long dark grey dress with a matching turban and too much dark makeup.

it would have really sucked if she had to go to jail for it though. i would have been pissed off and maybe thrown the book out the window ranting about how there was no justice in the world. i'd like to think there's some justice.

okay, so the garrote thing. it was weird. i caught it the first time because it was so random and he seemed a little bit uneasy when he was asking her about it. like he was testing the water to see how much she knew. and where he was concerned i was suspicious. maybe i'm better at that in the fictional world because in real life i'm like lalala miss oblivious, why would anyone lie for no reason? i didn't put the whole thing together. i've never heard of the thing actually. but it seemed like that's what he was talking about. and then will solved the whole thing in a second.

i was kind of mad at will for not going after her. he should have. he warned her and he knew just how dangerous eddie was and how she wasn't very good at dealing with his manipulation. the whole time she was wandering around in the cold i was comforting myself with the thought that any second he was going to come in and save the day and then he didn't. poo to him. although i do get his whole reasoning, i think a little thing like her being in danger is just a little bit more important than that. although i guess it goes with the whole need for carole to resolve the thing for herself and the anti-fairy tale where the woman can be the hero. it really bothered me that the police made it like two silly women were in the woods and eddie died trying to save them. just because eddie was such a freaking schmuck and he doesn't deserve the hero credit. and hello, who lived in the area longer and knew much more about survival? she was chocked full of survival facts. sheesh. thank god will taught her all of that survival stuff. i rambled away from my will point. i was glad that he stayed. yay will! he was a good guy. he didn't deserve the mess he was dragged into.

i think naomi cared about money and possessions. she was constantly trying to use them to fill the hole in her life but they never made her happy. the christmas tree thing with the empty presents was so awful. and i think i get why she followed carole to vermont. because in some sick way she felt like carole was her only friend. back in the day carole could be talked into anything and she took it for granted that carole would always give in to her. i felt really bad that she died though. she was essentially harmless (lol essentially). just very stupid. for most of the book i couldn't tell if she was really dumb and harmless or just shrewd enough to look that way. i would have liked to see her go on to live a happier life.

hell, i even felt bad for eddie dying, even though he walked into it himself and it kind of was a clever way. or maybe it just seemed clever because of the whole set-up with the spring traps before and then it came back and i didn't understand what was going on at first and then i realized what was going on and i got a very clear picture of it in my mind. it was cool that rita's name was the last thing he heard too.

umm what else did i want to say? i can't remember. maybe it was the way she built gloria up but i didn't really approve of gloria. and i didn't like the father much. maybe he was better as a sort of memory. when he was on the edge of her life it was like 'aww, your father really does care about you' and then when he was actually there he annoyed me. and poor pepper, he's going to grow up to be so messed up. it's funny how he's rebelling against his mother by being so conventional. i think he was my favorite character. i have issues with rachel so you know the whole part with her getting pissed off and being so unsupportive bothered me. and taking the baby on their ski trip, jesus christ!

and finally...“To be loved is to be known fully. To be known and still to be loved.” i'm sorry you didn't like that line because i think it's just great. well maybe it's a little awkward just stuck in there like that because it's like the moral of the story and usually authors don't write out word for word what they want you to get from the book. maybe i just love it because it's what i'm hoping to find (what crazy person can love me for all of my craziness?). i don't think a lot of people get it. it just made me happy to see it laid out there. at my school the couples getting together would say that they loved each other from the first day that they hooked up and i'm just there like 'no you don't. you don't even know each other yet.' so it just feels like now will and carole can have a deeper and more real relationship. it was really sad to me when she realized that the pictures that she thought were so happy were all false. so that ending was hopeful.

lynn: i think that naomi didn't even know until the day with the menu. and omg what a freaking grusome thing to have on a menu...wtf? i know nothing about business but that doesn't seem like a good idea to sell food. although it was a good way to get everything out, and i agree about will piecing the thing together. ha 'total payback with a side of ha.' ily that was awesome and i agree. oh i didn't think of naming the girl carole as foreshadowing, but you definitely have a point. at the time i was just kind of upset that it wasn't a girl.

Mkay, so I read the book in the past three days and it was absolutely wonderful.

You couldn't help to feel sorry for Carole and to hate Eddie. But no matter how frustrating it was that she wouldn't stand up for herself, I know she couldn't. She was just so scared and he kept threatening to bring it up in front of everyone. He had a hold on her.

I thought it was just so horrible that it captured her life for that long. I'm not sure what I would do in that situation, but I am pretty sure that I would have gotten the authorities involved. Even if it was when I went back to the Double Hearth. I couldn't live the way she lived, always looking behind your back, never safe, full of guilt. Jesus. And the thing is, she never got rid of him until it was all over with.

Some Responses:

I was kinda nervous for Carole and Naomi when they were tearing up the apartment. I was afraid that her parents were going to come out.

Yeah Zoe did kinda seem unimportant. But it was interesting to see that someone practically worshiped Naomi. She was a loose cannon and for someone to act as though she were some sort of god was amazing.

I never thought about the baby on the trip as a reason for Pam Lewis to have them stop. Very interesting observation. It's true, that was her excuse to keep the book moving. --AHhaha. the mechanics of writing.

I agree about her father's role in the end of the book. It did seem kind of out of place. And it was kind of annoying that she didn't catch that he was doing it to check on her out of love, but giving her her space.

I was glad that they had gotten things straightened out before she died. And I thought it was noble that she was going to tell everyone at the bar that Eddie did it. Especially since from the beginning she stood up for him.

Lol denise. I completely agree about the last page of the book. And then she has discussion questions in the back? I was like wtf?