I finished the book last night at about 1AM and I loved it. I really loved that there are so many topics to discuss. It's the perfect piece for a book club. I also think the writer's voice is really beautiful and touching. Even if, in this story anyway, a little confussing at times.
I guess first questions are:
-How did you feel about the story at the end of the book?
First discussion question from the back of the book-
-The narrative structure of Mercy alternates between the past and the present. How does this structure build suspense and pique a reader's curiosity about what will happen next? What insight do you get into the lives of Razi and the other characters because of the way the story is told?
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17 comments:
I really loved the first 2/3 or so of the book, not so much the last part. I think I got confused.
Maybe I've never been THAT in love before, but I thought Amy's dilemma seemed contrived. Here she is happily married to a great guy, but she can't get over her lost love? For some reason, I didn't have the same problem believing the Razi/Andrew love story.
I thought the author tied things up pretty nicely at the end. I felt the same way about Amy's loss of Jem. I was mad at her for shutting Scott out. I loved the story between Andrew and Razi.
I don't think I understood why Razi's spirit didn't cross over to the "other side" for so many years.
I thought it was ok, but a bit contrived and predictable. I knew poppa fin was Andrew long before she realized it.
I also thought that Amy had a ton of maturing to do or something.
If Razi kept helping folks who died on to the other side...why did she linger so long?
I think she stayed because she was looking for Andrew. It was my understanding that the people who were between were those with "unfinished business," and then they would cross over, but she wasn't finished til she found Andrew? That one guy who was learning to play the cello, as he did the things he had wanted to do before he died, his "form" started to change.
I guess that's where I got confused. It seemed unlikely that she couldn't find Andrew for all those years.
I agree with Sarah T that she didn't go because things were unresolved between her and Andrew. I think she fought really searching for him. Think about how resistant she was to the internet. Remember this was an inquisitive woman who had been accepted to medical school in the 20's. She wasn't ready to let go of her own grief.
I thought that Amy's loss of Jem was complicated by the loss of their child. It wasn't just their child, but the loss of the promise, the hope, and all of the possibilities of what he could have been. And even the question of whether or not she would have terminated that pregnancy had she known about it.
Amy also lost Jem at a pivotal time in their lives, just as Andrew lost Razi. They were just starting off into life, wrestling with the question of marriage. They found their ONE before they found or attained their dreams. They were searching for so many other things that love seemed to complicate them. Neither couple has a chance to make those choices, to regret them or to be glad for them.
Amy shutting Scott out is maddening and yet it's understandable. She doesn't want to. She loves him, but she's afraid that she'll never feel or be what she was to Jem. And she shuts him out, but she never really physically leaves. She is still connected to him, but she has to wrestle with her feelings for Jem that she never dealt with.
To answer the question about the narrative style, it mirrors that confusion that the characters feel. They are searching for knowledge, but they don't know what they're looking for or how to find it. Also, the book states that life--the soul of a person--is energy and connections of particles. Those things are not linear in the way that we're comfortable with. Particles collide in what seems to be a random manner and everything in life is possible.
Even think of how Razi dies--in water. She continues to fluidly travel between past and present. Even the thoughts of the past are not from her birth to her death, but the points that seem significant to her at whatever point she is.
In my opinion Amy had completely romanticized the thought of a baby with Jem. If I'm not mistaken, he/she didn't know she was pregnant at the time of the accident.
I definitely agree that Amy romanticized the baby with Jem. I think that the fact that she didn't know she was pregnant until she wasn't anymore made it much easier to do so. She says she's pretty certain she would have aborted and yet... But she doesn't know and she won't know. She doesn't have memory of finding out and having whatever emotions she would have had. Who knows what Jem would have wanted. And yet, it was all in spite of her birth control pills that someone like her would have taken religiously, so maybe she thought it was like the baby wanted to be born, was meant to be or inevitable.
I don't know, the whole Amy getting in touch with her feelings about Jem just seemed overdrawn and overboard. Life was going along swimmingly (sorry for the water reference) for Amy and Scott until she sees a video of Jem? I just don't buy it.
I do think the specter of sudden death and unfinished relationships is a subject well worth exploring. I'm sure each of us has faced a situation(s) like that. The idea of some sort of "do over" is an intriguing one, right?
Don't you think that Amy is also upset and kinda traumatized by her grandparents dealth, too? I think that her feelings for Jem, her unanswered, hidden and not-dealt-with feelings were just beneath the surface, like Twolly said that "Fin" did with Razi/Sunny.
I felt very sorry for Scott. I don't think that Luke would be that understanding but also, how weird that they were all friends? Scott and Jem and Amy and Chloe?
I think the reason Scott was able to deal with it that well is because he did know Jem. He had watched Amy with him and knew what that relationship was like. And how awful to feel like you were the consolation prize all that time, you know? She never probably would have been with him if Jem hadn't died.
But then, if Razi hadn't died, Amy never would have been BORN at all, so there's that to consider as well.
I do think that Amy's grandparents' deaths may have been what shook her out of her life that she was happy with. And just as Amy ends up with her dead lover's friend, Andrew ends up with Razi's best friend's little sister. It seems like as much as they couldn't handle or deal with the past, the ones they chose were still a link to it.
And yes, poor Scott. All those years he must have been in Jem's shadow, even if Amy didn't acknowledge it. Just as Amy saw her grandfather, not knowing that her grandmother was as much the consolation prize as he was.
Two thoughts about Amy's grandparents' deaths:
1. she was angry with her grandfather for throwing everything out (much more understanding when you know about his past)
2. she saw the photo of her grandmother and her first husband and realized that she never saw that spark or that closeness with her grandparents.
Also, K in the Mirror pointed out that if Razi hadn't died, Amy would never have been born and that's so right. I did think it was somehow fitting that Razi did somehow seem to live on in Amy. Andrew told Scott how she was "venturesome," and I think that he was comparing her to Razi.
I didn't complete my thought about #2. I think that's what started her really thinking about her own first love and whether or not the second love was quite as deep.
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