The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears Reading Guide & Discussion Questions

Book Club Discussion Questions

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For supplemental discussion material see our Beyond the Book article, Background info and our BookBrowse Review of The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears.

Please be aware that this discussion guide will contain spoilers!

About This Book

Seventeen years ago, Sepha Stephanos fled the Ethiopian Revolution for a new start in the United States. Now he finds himself running a failing grocery store in a poor African-American section of Washington, D.C., his only companions two fellow African immigrants who share his bitter nostalgia for his home continent. Years ago and worlds away Sepha could never have imagined a life of such isolation. As his environment begins to change, hope comes in the form of a friendship with new neighbors Judith and Naomi, a white woman and her bi-racial daughter.


Discussion Questions

1. Mengestu opens the novel with Sepha and his friends, Joseph and Kenneth, and the game that they play matching African coups with dictators and dates. The three come from different parts of Africa, and have left different places and people to be in the US. Why do they play this game? How does it affect their relationships with each other? With the country they now call home? With the continent they left behind? Though they are close friends with a long history, why do you think that Joseph reacts the way that he does when Sepha appears at the restaurant? What about Kenneth's attempts to help Sepha figure out a way to keep from losing the store? How do their differences help or hinder the narrative?
    
2. In recalling his uncle's questioning why he had "chosen to open a corner store in a poor black neighborhood," Sepha says that he had "never said it was because all I wanted...was to read quietly, and alone, for as much of the day as possible." Books play a huge role in Sepha's life as well as in the action of the Mengestu's story. Did you feel that a particular literary reference gave you a glimpse into Sepha's character that was unexpected or surprising? Which one and why? Or if not, why not?
    
3. Gentrification, class struggle, and ideas of democracy reverberate as prevailing themes in the novel. How does Mengestu weave these themes into the Sepha's interactions with Judith and Naomi? The race/class based polarization of Logan Circle? Judith's career?
    

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