Correction!! Correction!!

Apparently, reading a calendar is too challenging a task for me :(

The corrected book club date is Saturday, December 1 at 1pm.  Sorry for the confusion!! 

Better Late Than Never Book Club Brunch

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Hey Ladies,

I can't apologize enough for the delay in getting in touch with all of you regarding our end of summer book club meeting!!  Although, I am happy to report that we have our next gathering all set up for Saturday, December 2 at 1pm at Aunt JoAnn's house.  We will be discussing Defending Jacob by William Landay as well as Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen.  Please shoot me an email if you can make it and I can pass along driving directions.  I hope this proves to be a great time to get together before the craziness of holidays begin!  I put the discussion questions below and can't wait to see everyone.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS - DEFENDING JACOB

1. How would you have handled this situation if you were Andy? Would you make the same choices he made? Where would you differ the most?
   
2. Before and during the trial, how would you have handled the situation if you were Laurie? Do you feel she made strong choices as a mother and a wife?
   
3. Is Andy a good father? Why or why not?
   
4. Do you believe Jacob is guilty?
   
5. Is Jacob a product of his upbringing? Do you think he is he a violent person because his environment makes him violent, or do you think he has violent inclinations since birth?
   
6. Bulleying is such a hot topic in today's media. How did the author incorporate it into the story, and do you think it's role had anything to do with Jacob's disposition? How do you think people should stop adolescent bullying?
   
7. How much of a factor did Jacob's age play into your sympathies for him or lack thereof? If Jacob were seventeen, would you view him differently? What about nine?
   
8. Do you think Neal Logiudice acts ethically in this novel? What about Andy? What about Laurie?
   
9. What was the most damning piece of evidence against Jacob? Was there anything that you felt exonerated him?
   
10. If Jacob hadn't been accused, how do you think his life would have turned out? What kind of a man do you think he would grow up to be?

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS - PRIDE AND PREJUDICE

1. Pride and Prejudice is probably Austen's most famous, most beloved book. One element, the initial mutual dislike of two people destined to love each other, has become a cliché of the Hollywood romance. I'm sure you can think of numerous examples.
   
2. This book has been described by scholars as a very conservative text. Did you find it so? What sort of position do you see it taking on the class system? It has also been described as Austen's most idealistic book. What do you suppose is meant by that?
   
3. In 1814 Mary Russell Mitford wrote: "It is impossible not to feel in every line of Pride and Prejudice...the entire want of taste which could produce so pert, so worldly a heroine as the beloved of such a man as Darcy.... Darcy should have married Jane."
   
4. Would you have liked the book as well if Jane were its heroine?
   
5. Have you ever seen a movie version in which the woman playing Jane was, as Austen imagined her, truly more beautiful than the woman playing Elizabeth?
   
6. Who doesn't love Elizabeth Bennet?!!
   
7. Two central characters in Austen have her own first name.
   
8. In Emma: Jane Fairfax is a decorous, talented, beautiful woman.  In Pride and Prejudice: Jane Bennet is everything lovely.  What do you make of that?
   
9. Lydia and Wickham pose a danger to the Bennet family as long as they are unmarried and unchecked. But as a married couple, with little improvement in their behavior, this danger vanishes.
   
10. In Pride and Prejudice marriage serves many functions. It is a romantic union, a financial merger, and a vehicle for social regulation. Scholar and writer Mary Poovey said that Austen's goal "is to make propriety and romantic desire absolutely congruent."
    
11. Think about all the marriages in the book with respect to how well they are fulfilling those functions.  Is marriage today still an institution of social regulation?  What about it would change if gay marriage were legally recognized?
    
12. Austen suggests that in order to marry well a woman must be pretty, respectable, and have money. In the world of Pride and Prejudice, which of these is most important? Spare a thought for some of the unmarried women in the book—Mary and Kitty Bennet, Miss de Bourgh, Miss Georgiana Darcy, poor, disappointed Caroline Bingley. Which of them do you picture marrying some day? Which of them do you picture marrying well?
    
13. Was Charlotte Lucas right to marry Reverend Collins?
    
14. What are your feelings about Mr. Bennet? Is he a good father? A good husband? A good man?
    
15. Darcy says that one of Wickham's motivations in his attempted elopement with Georgiana was revenge. What motivations might he have had for running off with Lydia? (Besides the obvious...)
    
16. Elizabeth Bennet says,".... people themselves alter so much, that there is something new to be observed in them for ever."
    
17. Do any of the characters in the book change substantially? Or do they, as Elizabeth says of Darcy, "in essentials" remain much as they ever were?
    
18. 10. Elizabeth is furious with Darcy for breaking up the match between Jane and Mr. Bingley. Although he initially defends himself, she changes his mind. Later when Lady Catherine attempts to interfere in his own courtship, he describes this as unjustifiable.
    
19. Should you tell a friend if you think they're about to make a big mistake romantically?
    
20. Have you ever done so? How did that work out for you?