GDT Book Club: Ordinary Grace

[fitin14]

good morning! I will have to post and run.  daycare closed and I have my grandson today!  

I hope you all enjoyed the book. Let's discuss first impressions.  I liked the nostalgia of childhood roaming free, riding bikes and the perspective of kids making sense of a grown up world. 

[bernelli]

Loved this story so much.

I felt quite a bit of nostalgia while reading it, and I feel like that's on the author being able to make me feel the heat of the summer, feel the fear in the boys when coming up to a bully, smell the cigarette smoke lingering in the air after their mom was not in the house. I kept remembering my own times growing up -- riding bikes, walking to the city pool, walking to the convenience store to buy candy with my brother. I felt the nostalgia so much.

I've got to read more from this author.

[mare]

I listened and found it to be an incredibly engrossing story. I too felt really transported and the scenes felt quite vivid. I wish I had finished it more recently so that my memories of it were clearer to discuss this week.....

[bumblebuzz21]

Hi all! I really enjoyed this book. The author really did a great job of making you feel like you were there. I found the ending to have a little too much God and miracles for me, but overall 4 stars!

[moosishun]

I loved it at first and a lot because of the scenery. I adored Jake. I was so afraid that he might be One of the Unfortunates that I could barely turn a page thinking he was getting lost (which he did once and I almost threw my computer across the room).

That oldest son had an opportunity to be a career criminal, I think. What did he end up doing anyway?

And my gosh, WHAT A LOT OF DEATH GOIN'ON IN THAT SMALL PLACE that summer.

[juliajones54]

I enjoyed being taken back to the freedom of my childhood. Hot humid summers, riding my bike everywhere and learning at 10 to ride with 'no hands', no adult around telling me to be careful. Skating for blocks on my 'key- turned' roller skates - those darn things digging into the sides of my shoes. Playing ball and hide & seek till the streetlights came on. I was always responsible for keeping track of my youngest brother but he would run off on his own - no one could control him - the bane of my existence!

Also, crouching outside under the open kitchen windows in the backyard to hear what the adults were talking about. We kids were always shooed outside when neighbors arrived to visit. Lots of good gossip!

[Viognier]

I think I got to the bottom of the first page and as I turned it, I was thinking-- woah, what just happened? Because I was suddenly a 13year old boy. Or a 40something man reliving my life as that boy. I felt sucked into and a part of the story from its first sentences.

I kind of wanted to stop and figure out/analyze the writing to see why I was so completely pulled in, but I didn't want to lose the magic.

[ccToast]

I really enjoyed this book. Having Frank as the narrator and seeing the world and the problems through his lens in this Stand by Me setting pulled me in from the beginning. The foreshadowing of how many deaths were to come had me worried for Ariel right away.

[ccToast]

Jun 21, 2021 8:20:34 GMT -5 moosishun said:

I adored Jake

I did too, and I felt a connection between him and Owen from A Prayer for Owen Meany. I have to admit that I haven't re-read it recently and I'm a little hazy on the details of that book, but it's more of the lasting impression I have of Owen.

[peacemama]

I thought it was a beautiful, lyrical novel. I listened to the audiobook. The perfect narrator.

I love a good mystery. I missed the clues. I did not guess the whodunit.

I especially appreciated the insightful author interview at the end of the audiobook.

The "ordinary grace" scene with Jake was amazing. Powerful title.

[deanna0519]

I really liked this book when I first read it, voted for it, then realized I didn't really remember details. So I started the audiobook again and am about halfway through--I'll finish tomorrow. In real life I am a little older than Jake and a little younger than Frank. We lived outside of a big town, more in a rural area than suburbs, although there were several houses in close proximity in our neighborhood. My parents weren't as casual about us running around as Frank's parents, but we did have a lot of freedom. I can identify with the hot summers, suffering on top of the sheets and hoping for a breeze so we could sleep. My mom was a good cook, but I remember some of our friends across the road weren't so lucky. Their mom smoked and drank and fixed pretty awful meals, but she was a nice person and was always welcoming to us kids. I was kind of horrified at the state of their house, but in retrospect I admire how she didn't really care and never apologized.

We were raised in a little church of a denomination that later united with a Methodist church, so I can identify with that, too. I loved tuna casserole--lol. I can see how the church congregation would be horrified at Frank's mother. It's not fair but a lot of times churches expect the minister's wife to be an unpaid employee. We had a minister once whose wife was a lot like Frank's mother--a well-educated and sophisticated musician. She participated very little in church women's groups and was regarded as snooty and aloof, but I think she was shy and didn't really have much in common with most of the other church women. They later divorced, actually, and she ended up teaching music at a university and playing violin in a local symphony orchestra.

I wasn't nearly as observant of adults as Frank apparently was. I thought of us as just a normal, boring family and never noticed any undercurrents and not much tension between my parents. One similarity was that my maternal grandfather (at least at first) didn't think my dad was good enough for my mom and hated that Dad "took her away" from West Virginia to Ohio and then to Kansas. Also my dad was a much more authoritarian figure than Frank's father. He was also a WWII veteran and the few times I ever heard him talk about the war was with other veterans.

[zoomingzebra]

Lurker joining in here. It was such a great story. I spent all day yesterday reading it and was completely pulled into the story. It is a perfect mix of mystery, love story, coming of age, tragedy and overcoming.

[fitin14]

Day 2: So many secrets in this town! so many intertwining connections as a result. What secrets did you guess? which ones surprised you and did you wish some had been revealed that ultimately were not?

[bumblebuzz21]

I guessed that Ariel was meeting someone besides Karl. I did not guess that he was gay and I was so freaking sad when that secret came out. Once the crow bar was mentioned as the murder weapon I guessed that it was the sister since she had already gone after Frank once with it.

[bernelli]

I guessed that Ariel was pregnant. I also thought she was meeting that kid that was the bully (I forgot his name) -- I was pretty grossed out when it was Emil.

I guessed that Karl was homosexual when Frank's mother told Karl's mother "what are you hiding".... but I don't think the parents actually knew about Karl afterall (?)

I was so wrong about Doyle. Everything I guessed about him was wrong -- but I still believe he's a creep.

I also thought Frank's mom was having an affair -- which I was wrong about. I was more wrong about my suspicions that I was right. Which makes for a better read, I think.

[peacemama]

I picked up on Emil and Ariel's relationship and the pregnancy pretty early. I actually thought he had likely killed her. His sister wasn't on my radar though.

Did we ever learn the history of the man that the boys found dead by the railroad tracks early on in the story?

This snippet captures that thread of mystery about all lives:
It seems to me that when you look back at a life, yours or another's, what you see is a path that weaves into and out of deep shadow. So much is lost. What we use to construct the past is what has remained in the open, a hodgepodge of fleeting glimpses. our histories, like my father's current body, are structures built of toothpicks. So what I recall is a construct both of what stands in the light and what I imagine in the dark where I cannot see.

[zoomingzebra]

I guessed that Ariel was in love with and possibly sleeping with Emil but not the pregnancy. I also first thought he killed her, but then suspected the sister.

I was surprised about Karl.

[moosishun]

I think the unraveling of things might be the thing I was not as thrilled with.

I was so afraid the next person was going to be Jake, but then it kind of pointed to Ariel, didn't it? I didn't suspect Emil of killing her but after Karl stated who he was, I knew that she slept with him at least once (and so she did). At that point, I knew it was the sister and I am with Frankie here - I think she definitely knew she did it and was not necessarily happy about it but not sad about it either. I think that there might have been a possibility that she did not recognize it was Ariel outside and was merely defending the farm but then she kept the jewelry. What really makes me think that she not only found this fortuitous but might have been waiting for the perfect time is that Ariel was not dead yet and could possibly have survived if the sister had gone inside to tell Emil. But this did not happen.

Hmmmmm.

I was so afraid that Jake would convince Frankie not to tell about Emil's sister. I get that he had a special kinship to her but she was a dangerous person and needed a lot more supervision than Emil could ever give her. I loved Jake and questioned his common sense here, but then he was just a child, so I gave him a pass and hope to heck he grew into a person with MORE SENSE.

It made perfect sense to me that Emil tried to kill himself once this was all out in the open. So sad that the adults' relationships severed at that point. I know he loved those chess games.

ONE TIME AND SHE GETS KNOCKED UP?? Man, that sucked. I figured she was pregnant but just knew Karl was the sperm-depositer.

You haven't asked who was our favorite character, but I'll answer it anyhow - the dad, although I did like Gus quite a bit.

We never did find out what Gus meant when he called the dad out about what happened in WWII.

[moosishun]

Oh, and I get the attraction to her mentor. I was wildly enamored with my college professor, who opened the world of piano playing to me. Man, he was a yeller and a light-up-his-cigarette-and-growl type but he was a fantastic teacher. I can remember one day that he listened to me play, lit up a cigarette, harumph and harangue about his lot in life and went phrase by phrase with me because I was such a dope. And on that day I "got" it, and he almost fell off his bench - it was like he had spent a year and a half trying to beat some sense into me and then it happened. It took me years to figure out the "getting" but his lessons were the most exciting lessons I have ever had. I imagine Emil was like that. It would be easy to fall in love with that spirit.

I hated that Karl came to his sad end. I had a cousin (probably 2nd or 3rd cousin) who was gay. He was born and raised in SC and got the hell out of there and became a much sought-after designer in California. He died tragically in an automobile accident when he was in his 50's but he lived a fantastic life in a place that accepted him. I wish Karl could have seen that possibility and leave all those small-town twits behind. But I can see how a young person could find themselves in a hopeless place. I just hate that he fell victim to it.

[ccToast]

Like zoomingzebra I guessed that Ariel and Emil were sleeping together, but not that she was pregnant. I also half expected Frank's mother to be having an affair, most likely with Emil. I'm glad that the story did not take that predictable turn.

I didn't think that Emil killed Ariel, but I also didn't consider Lise until just before it was revealed.

I too wanted to know for sure about Bobby Cole's death.

[Viognier]

I suspected the next death would be Ariel early when it was hinted that the next would be more personal. There was an attempted suicide thrown in before the death that threw me for some time (I almost went back to reread that passage to see if I'd misunderstood, but I did not.)

Emil and Ariel seemed like a given, though I didn't want to believe it, especially when she wanted to skip Julliard while Karl still went away to college. The pregnancy was no surprise, though until she was found I was missing clues that it was murder and not possibly suicide. A piece of jewelry in the possession of another person who is known to collect things, doesn't scream murder to me.

I wanted to know more about WWII and the dad and Gus, but understand why Frankie did not press them for more -- though he might have gotten away with it at 13.

[deanna0519]

I am terrible at picking up clues and predicting things. I also thought that the mom was the one having the affair with Emil, and also glad she didn't. She was such an unhappy person, though; I would not have been surprised if she had committed suicide. I felt sorry for her. I would probably have been unhappy with my marriage if I thought I was marrying a lawyer and ended up a preacher's wife.

I was hoping that the WWII secrets would be revealed. At the beginning when Gus was so drunk and said such horrible things to the dad was disturbing. How they could be so close when there were such things in Gus's head, I don't know.

[fitin14]

Day 3:  There was a lot of disability, stereotyping, racism in the book.  Was this realistic for the time and have things changed that much?  Bobby Cole being different, Warren Redman and the other Indian residents,  Karl Brandt and homosexuality.  Lise and even Emil all had some sort of disability etc. 

[bumblebuzz21]

I would have to assume it was realistic, but I wasn't born until 1981 so no firsthand knowledge for me. I found the Indian stuff to the most interesting (for the lack of a better word) as I didn't grow up in the part of the country where there were any significant number of Indians living.

[zoomingzebra]

I would definitely say realistic and actually probably toned down. They were a minister’s family—they probably didn’t experience the worst things that were said and done. I would like to believe things are better now, and in a lot of areas they are, but we still have the same issues.