1. Angel avoids the advances of men describing them as “horizontal lines” that don’t lead anywhere, while Hannah is easily charmed by the first boy that pays her any attention. What are the reasons for this difference?

2. Angel believes being pretty is “useful,” to help her get what she needs. Hannah finds beauty seductive and craves affirmation of her own beauty. Mother believes beauty is unnecessary and dangerous. Who do you agree with most? Do you think Mother is right that beauty is particularly important to Hannah because she is a “true artist?”

3. Why does wanting scare Mother? Is it just because of Leah, or is there something else that troubles her? Does Angel get what she wanted? Does Hannah? Does Mother?

4. Angel believes that lies are mercy. Is she right?

5. Why doesn’t Father’s drawn bridge work for Hannah? Why does Father say they’ve worn themselves out trying to build their own bridge?

6. Why, even though Hannah was taught so differently, was it easy for her to let Sam pull her close under that Live Oak tree? Why did the alarms she was taught to hear not work for her?

7. Why is Bethie able to escape Mother’s hold on her, form her own beliefs, and enjoy a normal adulthood? Why isn’t Hannah able to do the same?

8. Did Hannah abandon Angel because she didn’t fight Mother to keep her?

9. Did Hannah, rocking in the empty nursery, really hear Angel cry out to her over the baby monitor?

10. Bethie says “emptiness is the miracle canvas.” Do you agree?

11. At first glance, Angel and Hannah have very different childhoods. But as their stories develop, shared themes emerge. In what ways were their childhoods similar? Do you think one of them had a worse childhood than the other?

12. Do you agree with Daniel, that “love is an emergency?” How was love an emergency in this novel?

13. Mother cries that she put “stones over [her] children.” What were those stones? Were they ever lifted off, or did her children simply learn to live in spite of them?

14. Why was it so important to Angel to tell her story? Why wasn’t it enough just to be reunited with her mother?

15. When Angel wakes up tied down in the basement, she decides that “blood isn’t nearly as important” as she always thought when it comes to defining a family. What makes a family? Is it shared beliefs, like a bridge? Is it shared desires, like whiskey? How much does “blood” matter?

16. Who is the memory thief? Are there multiple memory thieves in this novel?

17. Angel believes there are only two kinds of people in this world: Swarms, and those stuck waiting beneath the sycamore tree. Which category does Mother belong to? Father? Bethie? What do you think the future holds for Angel? Does she make it out from under the sycamore tree? What about Hannah?