This novel was written to spur discussion. Use the questions below or come up with your own as you make your way through the book.
Were Suzanne and Mac happy before the accident?
Do you identify with Suzanne’s intense feelings about being in the mountains?
Was Suzanne in any way responsible for the accident?
How much of the blame for the deaths do the teenage pranksters hold?
Suzanne’s loss of her husband and her parents is in some ways, unimaginable. Do you have a sense of how you would cope with such loss?
Marilee is with Suzanne every step of the way from her discharge from the hospital to the last page of the book. Is the fact she is single a reason she is free to be so attentive to her friend? What would be different is Marilee had had a partner?
How could Suzanne have been so intimidated by her dad’s report of mice in the attic that she never went up there? Would you have ventured up the screaming pull-down attic steps?
Searching for birth parents is very common today. When should it have dawned on Suzanne that her story was unusually tightly sealed?
Suzanne questions Marilee about whether overly kind-hearted Polly is “for real?” Do you know anyone as generous and positive as Polly?
In the Bolivian hospital, the head nurse, Leyna, is alienated from the American women because of the way her country has been slighted by the United States. Did she sincerely intend to help Suzanne?
Retired maternity nurse, Edme Parades, decides to tell Suzanne the story of her birth mother because Suzanne resembles her mother. Do you think Suzanne could’ve persuaded Edme to share the story with her if Suzanne had not looked like her mom?
Sister Mary Olivia seldom comes out of the fog of her dementia. But occasionally, for a few minutes, she is lucid. Have you had the experience of speaking with a person like the sister?
Upon meeting Sister Mary Olivia, Polly is consumed with finding out what is hanging from the chain around her neck. It was unusual for a sister in her order to be allowed to keep a personal possession. How had she earned this privilege?
Bradley Bowman honored Olivia’s wishes to resist contacting her. Should he have at least tried?
What did you think of Bradley’s explanation for why he didn’t seek a romantic relationship after leaving the priesthood?
At the gala, Polly makes sure she gets to meet Olivia’s old friend, Liliana Perez, by breaking into song and walking into the room they were barred from. What did she risk to do so?
Was Sister Mary Olivia out of bounds to have told Liliana to disregard the church doctrine on divorce? Did she believe she had committed a sin?
Suzanne returns home to discover more shocking information about her birth story as she peruses her parents’ wedding photo album. Is her anger justified?
Suzanne resolves the lawsuit she filed against the truck driver, the truck company, and the juvenile delinquents in an unusual way. Was it worth giving up the $1 million?
What did you think of Suzanne’s decision to visit Bradley? Her decision to upend her life by moving permanently?
Suzanne fears that Mac had conspired against her with her mother, and is relieved when she finds out he had refused to do so. Was her analysis of the situation fair to Mac?
Suzanne’s friends comment that she and Bradley are unlikely to leave Bolivia while Sister Mary Olivia is alive. She agrees. Is it sensible for her to limit herself when Sister Mary Olivia isn’t even aware of her presence most of the time.
Suzanne disposes of her family’s ashes in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia and in the Andes of Bolivia. Is her reasoning in selecting these locations about her (and their) love for the mountains, or that these mountains are the locales of her birth and her life after that? Is any part of the reason the fact that they perished in the mountains?
How much of an impact did Marilee and Polly have on Suzanne’s recovery?
How was general practice lawyer, Darren Long, important to the story?