THE MEANING OF GRACE by Deborah Forster Format: Trade Paperback ISBN: 9781742755342 Imprint: Vintage Australia Released in May,

2012 Reading Group Questions

1. Edith and Juliets relationship, from their earliest childhood, has always been complicated and more often than not fraught. What are the formative moments that drew the battlelines? How much is their relationship impacted by their natures over any specific incident? 2. Discuss each childs relationship with Grace. How does she protect, nurture, thwart or complicate her childrens lives? How do you regard her as a mother, and how sympathetic is she as a character? Can you make an argument that she favours one child over the others? Do all mothers have a favourite child? 3. There is an immediate fatherly, masculine void created when Ian commits suicide. How does this event, and the manner of his death, impact each of the siblings throughout their lives. How do the other men in the novel fill or frustrate this void? 4. What is the meaning of grace as a word, as a concept, as the books title, as the books central character. What kind of resolution does the novel leave us with? To what degree does each sibling attain a state of grace? 5. Given that Edie and Grace is the central relationship in the book, what is the significance of the final scene taking place between Ted and Grace? 6. The author refers to this book as her mother book. Did you read it as a book about mothers and mothering?
Reading Group Questions from The Meaning of Grace by Deborah Forster Available in bookshops and ebook retailers May 2012 Print ISBN: 9781742755342 | ebook ISBN: 9781742755359 Imprint: Vintage Australia | Publisher: Random House Australia
Copyright Deborah Forster 2012. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.