Above The Thunder Reading Guide & Discussion Questions

Book Club Discussion Questions

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For supplemental discussion material see our Beyond the Book article, and our BookBrowse Review of Above The Thunder.

Please be aware that this discussion guide will contain spoilers!

The introduction, discussion questions, suggested reading list, and author biography that follow are designed to enhance your group's discussion of the unforgettable Above the Thunder, an astonishing debut novel which explores the subtle, treacherous line between living and dying and captures in gorgeously rendered language the unexpected entanglements of the heart that can transform a life forever.

Introduction

Devastated by the loss of her beloved husband and numb over the callous disappearance of her drug-addicted daughter, Anna has buried her grief in her medical work and wants nothing more than to be left blissfully alone. Yet when her son-in-law and the ten-year-old granddaughter who she has never met arrive on her doorstep, bereft and hoping to stay awhile, Anna's world shifts irrevocably. Despite her attempts to maintain a protective distance from the newcomers, Anna is hopelessly beguiled by the child Flynn, whose dark and fanciful imagination thinly veils the scars of a damaging childhood.

Anna's life takes another unforeseen trajectory when she meets Jack, an AIDS patient reluctantly participating in a discussion group Anna is coordinating. Engaged in a brutal, private struggle with his mortality—and the questionable choices that have landed him with the virus—Jack recognizes in Anna a conflicted soul and a kindred spirit. Soon the unlikely duo, with Flynn in tow, set up a makeshift home in rural Maine, in search of peace, renewal, and the opportunity for healing. Heartbreak hovers close, however. As Flynn's obsession with death and reincarnation spirals toward a dangerous brink, Anna, Jack, and the friends they call family discover both the limits of devotion and the transformative power of tragedy.

Funny, wise, and often chilling, Above the Thunder offers an utterly unique take on loyalty, survival, the various incarnations of faith, and the ultimate search for home that drives us all.


Reader's Guide

1. As the novel opens, Anna doubts her own capacity for compassion: "Deep down she suspected that this trait, along with the maternal one, had never been activated in her. She doubted if it was possible to understand someone else's suffering. Even her beloved husband whose pain had become a private geography on which she couldn't trespass" [p. 21]. Is this cynicism or honesty at work in Anna? Do her relationships with Flynn and Jack change her aptitude for compassion and/or her ability to recognize it?
    
2. Above the Thunder is rich in symbolism, particularly surrounding Anna's voyage to self-knowledge. What is the symbolic significance of her collection of antique hair pins? Her cell pathology slides? What does it mean when she randomly buys a collection of books about female hunters? Why does she have a penchant for dropping things? What other symbols does the author weave into Anna's story?
    
3. What complex facets of motherhood—or the desire for it—does the author explore through the characters of Anna, Greta, Poppy, Leila, and Jane? What distinction does Anna draw between "maternal instinct" and "motherhood" [p. 116]? What different aspects of the concept of fatherhood are represented by Marvin, Mike, Jack, and Stuart?
    

Unless otherwise stated, this discussion guide is reprinted with the permission of Anchor Books. Any page references refer to a USA edition of the book, usually the trade paperback version, and may vary in other editions.