return to home  
Join   |  Gift   |  Member Login   |  Library Login
BookBrowse Mobile
Follow Us: 
   Reading Guides

Defending Jacob by William Landay: Questions, plus a reading group guide, with links to reviews, excerpt, author interview and author biography at BookBrowse.com.

Defending Jacob

Defending Jacob
A Novel
by William Landay
Hardcover: Jan 2012,
432 pages.
Paperback: Feb 2013,
496 pages.

Publication information
Author Information
Critics' Opinion:   
Readers' Rating:  
About BookBrowse Rankings
Share: 
Buy This Book

Reading Guide Questions

 Printer Friendly Guide

Please be aware that this discussion guide may contain spoilers!

  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. Bullying 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?


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


Become a Member
Click Here
Editor's Choice
  •  May 20 
  •  May 18 
  •  May 16 
Fever
Mary Beth Keane

Fever Jacket

A bold, mesmerizing novel about the woman known as "Typhoid Mary," the first known healthy carrier of typhoid fever in the burgeoning metropolis of early twentieth century New York.
The Woman Upstairs
Claire Messud

The Woman Upstairs Jacket

The riveting confession of a woman awakened, transformed, and betrayed by passion and desire for a world beyond her own.
How to Create the Perfect Wife
Wendy Moore

How to Create the Perfect Wife Jacket

Stranger than fiction, blending tragedy and farce, How to Create the Perfect Wife is an engrossing tale of the radicalism, and deep contradictions, at the heart of the Enlightenment.
Click Here
   Most Recent Blog Entries
Movies Based on Books: Summer 2013 (May - August)
Jewish Young Adult Books That Are Not About The Holocaust
Books to Give This Mother's Day
rss  RSS   rss  subscribe
Recent Reader Reviews
Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald by Therese Fowler
Z, the novel about the life of Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald is at points charming and; like another reviewer, I kept thinking of the movie, "Midnight... read more
Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver
Although heavy on the scientific details, which slowed down the story for me (OK, I admit, I was one of those liberal arts majors who skipped out on... read more
The House at the End of Hope Street by Menna van Praag
Loved this book. Magical, quirky, enchanting I could go on. All books do not have to be literary fiction, sometimes it is just so comforting to read... read more
RSS RSS feed More...  
Most Viewed This Week
1. Half the Sky
Nicholas D. Kristof, Sheryl WuDunn
2. Lots of Candles, Plenty of Cake
Anna Quindlen
3. Because of Winn-Dixie
Kate DiCamillo
4. Eagle Strike
Anthony Horowitz
5. K Blows Top
Peter Carlson
More...
Book Club Recommendations
The Gods of Gotham
by Lyndsay Faye
Paperback (Mar/13)
Forgotten Country
by Catherine Chung
Paperback (Mar/13)
Philida
by André Brink
Paperback (Feb/13)
Gone Girl
by Gillian Flynn
Hardback (Jun/12)
More...
First Impressions
Members read and review books often months before they're published. See what they think in First Impressions!
The Laws of Gravity
by Liz Rosenberg
4.5 Stars            (May/13)
The Sisterhood
by Helen Bryan
Four Stars            (Apr/13)
A Dual Inheritance
by Joanna Hershon
Four Stars            (May/13)
More...
  Latest BookBrowse News
British Parliament asks Amazon to clarify why it pays $9 million in income tax on $23 billion of UK sales. (May 20 2013)
Amazon will be called back to give further evidence to members of the British Parliament "to clarify how its activities in the U.K. justify its low corporate... Full Story
rss RSS feed More...
 
BookBrowse Poll
Q: Which of these Summer movies based on books would you like to see? (Info on each movie here)
The Great Gatsby
Epic
Man of Steel
World War Z
The Lone Ranger
The Wolverine
R.I.P.D.
Percy Jackson
Paranoia
The Mortal Instruments
Select Any That Apply
Search: Title or Author
Free Newsletters
Bring Up the Bodies

Online Book Club
More about
Five Days
Join the discussion!


Win This Book!
The Pigeon Pie Mystery


Enter To Win Now!

wordplay
Solve this clue:
"I I M B T Give T T R"

and be entered
to win....
frame top
New Author
Interviews
Menna van Praag
Erica Brown
Helga Weiss
Kate Morton
frame bottom
HOME Book Submissions | Advertising | Library Subscriptions | Reviewing for BookBrowse | Contact Us