True Colors (55 page)

Jazz up your meeting with a
True Colors
theme night—cowboy hats, country music, margaritas (leaded or unleaded), and ice cream. Discuss each person’s favorite ice cream and what that says about his or her personality.

To learn more about
True Colors—and
to find more special features—go to
KristinHannah.com
.

Go to
ExploreHoodCanal.com
and see pictures of this very special part of the state.

Reading Group Questions

1. In the novel’s opening scene, Henry pits one daughter against the other by simply handing one a lead rope. Winona realizes the impact of his action and knows that from then on, something in their family is changed. Does her realization change the outcome or solidify it? How does this scene reflect the central conflict in the novel? How do Henry’s choices set in motion the difficulties that lie ahead?
   
2. Winona, Aurora, and Vivi Ann have similar and idealized perceptions of their mother. How has her absence affected them, separately and collectively? Conversely, each sister has a radically different perception of Henry. Who is the real Henry? Which sister has the most accurate understanding of who he is? Is Henry’s antipathy toward his daughters subject to interpretation or is he as cold and uncaring as he appears?
   
3. There is obviously a symbiotic relationship between person and place in this novel. What part does the small-town setting play in the novel? Could this story have taken place in a big city? What would have played out differently, in your opinion? What would have remained the same? How does the setting reflect the differences between Vivi Ann and Winona? Certainly it appears at first glance that Vivi Ann is more rooted at Water’s Edge and in Oyster Shores than Winona. Is this really true?
   
4. The Grey sisters would have said that they were happy before Dallas came to town. Is that true? Or was Winona right at fifteen when she observed that “from then on, jealousy had become an undercurrent, swirling beneath their lives”? Was Dallas actually the cause of their troubles? Was Luke? Or was the disintegration of the family inevitable? Who is most to blame for the bad things that happen to the Grey family?
   
5. For a long time, Vivi has been “the beautiful one,” Aurora “the peacemaker,” and Winona “the smart one.” How do perceived roles contribute to the hostilities that lie beneath the surface of the family? Is this dynamic at work in most families?
   
6. How do Winona’s weaknesses and vulnerabilities play into the story? How do her strengths? Do you see her as a likable character? A good sister?
   
7. How about Vivi Ann? In what way is she really the architect of her own life? How do her strengths and weaknesses allow for all of the good and bad things in the novel to happen? How would this story have been changed by honesty between the sisters from the beginning?
   
8. There are several moments in the story when Winona makes difficult choices. Was she right to tell Luke about Vivi Ann’s affair? Should she have represented Dallas at his first trial? Did she deny the case for personal or professional reasons?
   
9. Noah becomes the first true catalyst for change in the Grey family. Like Vivi Ann, Aurora, and Winona, he has grown up in the shadow of loss. He is a fatherless boy; they are motherless girls. How has Vivi Ann’s parenting hurt Noah and set him on his self-destructive path? Is Vivi Ann’s downfall understandable? Regrettable? Unacceptable? If she had been your sister, what would you have done to help her deal with Dallas’s imprisonment?
   
10. Do you understand Dallas? Or did he remain enigmatic throughout the story? Did your belief in his guilt or innocence change throughout the course of the novel? How much did he contribute to his own legal problems? How did Vivi Ann contribute to them? When did he fall in love with Vivi Ann, and why?
    
11. Prejudice is an important component of the story. In small, close-knit communities like Oyster Shores, it can often be difficult to be perceived as an outsider. How much of Dallas’s arrest depends upon prejudice? Would he have been arrested as quickly if he’d been “one of them”? What if he had been white? How much did his own bad reputation in town work against him?
    
12. Eyewitness testimony is often unreliable. This is especially true for minorities and people of color. Why do you think this is? What should we, as a society, do about it? Was Myrtle mistaken in her testimony? Did she simply see what she expected to see?
    
13. Was Vivi Ann wrong to give up on Dallas? Was Dallas right to ask it of her?
    
14. Discuss Henry. Does he change over the course of the story? Does he love his daughters? How did the loss of his wife contribute to the father he has become? Would he change if he could?
    
15. Think about the future. How is the Grey family changed by all that they have endured? Where do they go from here? Do Vivi, Noah, and Dallas stay at Water’s Edge? What about Winona? How has she been changed by the journey she has undertaken? Is she still jealous of her sister? Desperate for her father’s love? Will she stay in Oyster Shores? Should she? Will she and Luke make a future together? And what about Noah? For most of his life he’s been able to blame his bad behavior on someone else. What will his life be like now that his father is home?
    

Read on for a sneak
peek at Kristin Hannah’s
new book

Copyright © 2010 by Kristin Hannah

Not, not mine: it’s somebody else’s wound. I could never have borne it. So take the thing that happened, hide it, stick it in the ground. Whisk the lamps away. . . Night.

—A
NNA
A
KHMATOVA, FROM
P
OEMS OF
A
KHMATOVA
,
TRANSLATED BY
S
TANLEY
K
UNITZ, WITH
M
AX
H
AYWARD

On the banks of the mighty Columbia River, in this icy season when every breath became visible, the orchard called Belye Nochi was quiet. Dormant apple trees stretched as far as the eye could see, their sturdy roots coiled deep in the cold, fertile soil. As temperatures plummeted and color drained from land and sky, the whitened landscape caused a kind of winter blindness, one day became indistinguishable from the next. Everything froze, turned fragile.

Nowhere were the cold and quiet more noticeable than in Meredith Whitson’s own house. At twelve, she had already discovered the empty spaces that gathered between people. She longed for her family to be like those she saw on television, where everything looked perfect and everyone got along. No one, not even her beloved father, understood how alone she often felt within these four walls, how invisible.

But tomorrow night, all of that would change.

She had come up with a brilliant plan. She had written a play based on one of her mother’s fairy tales, and she would present it at the annual Christmas party. It was exactly the kind of thing that would happen on an episode of
The Partridge Family
.

“How come I can’t be the star?” Nina whined. It was at least the tenth time she’d asked this question since Meredith had finished the script.

Meredith turned around in her chair and looked down at her nine-year-old sister, who was crouched on the wooden floor of their bedroom, painting a messy mint-green castle on an old bedsheet.

Meredith bit her lower lip, trying not to frown. The castle was too messy, not right at all. “Do we have to talk about this again, Nina?”

“But
why
can’t I be the peasant girl who marries the prince?”

“You know why. Jeff is playing the prince and he’s thirteen. You’d look silly next to him.”

Nina put her paintbrush in the empty soup can and sat back on her heels. With her short black hair, bright green eyes, and pale skin, she looked like a perfect little pixie. “Can I be the peasant girl next year?”

“You bet.” Meredith grinned. She loved the idea that she might be creating a family tradition. All of her friends had traditions, but not the Whitsons, they had always been different. There was no stream of relatives who came to their house on holidays, no turkey on Thanksgiving or ham on Easter, no prayers that were always said. Heck, they didn’t even know for sure how old their mom was.

It was because Mom was Russian, and alone in this country. Or at least that was what Dad said. Mom didn’t say much of anything about herself.

A knock at the door surprised Meredith. She looked up just as Jeff Cooper and her father came into the room.

Meredith felt like one of those long, floppy balloons being slowly filled with air, taking on a new form with each breath, and in this case the breath was Jeffrey Cooper. They’d been best friends since fourth grade, but lately it felt different to be around him. Exciting. Sometimes, when he looked at her, she could barely breathe. “You’re right on time for rehearsal.”

He gave her one of his heart-stopping smiles. “Just don’t tell Joey and the guys. They’d give me a ton of crap for this.”

“About rehearsal,” her dad said, stepping forward. He was still in his work clothes, a brown leisure suit with orange topstitching. Surprisingly, there was no smile lurking beneath his bushy black mustache or in his eyes. He held out the script. “This is the play you’re doing?”

Meredith rose from the chair. “Do you think she’ll like it?”

Nina stood up. Her heart-shaped face was uncharacteristically solemn. “Will she?”

The three of them looked at one another over the expanse of the Picasso-style green castle and the costumes laid out across the bed. The truth they passed among themselves, in looks alone, was that Anya Whitson was a cold woman, any warmth she had was directed at her husband. Precious little of it reached her daughters. When they were younger, Dad had tried to pretend it was otherwise, to redirect their attention like a magician, mesmerizing them with the brightness of his affection, but as with all illusions, the truth ultimately appeared behind it.

So they all knew what Meredith was asking.

“I don’t know, Meredoodle,” Dad said, reaching into his pocket for his cigarettes. “Your mother’s stories—”

“I love it when she tells them,” Meredith said.

“It’s the only time she really talks to us,” Nina added.

Dad lit a cigarette and stared at them through a swirl of gray smoke, his brown eyes narrowed. “Yeah,” he said, exhaling. “It’s just . . .”

Meredith moved toward him, careful not to step on the painting. She understood his hesitation; none of them ever really knew what would set Mom off, but this time Meredith was sure she had the answer. If there was one thing her mother loved, it was this fairy tale about a reckless peasant girl who dared to fall in love with a prince. “It only takes ten minutes, Dad. I timed it. Everyone will love it.”

“Okay, then,” he said finally.

She felt a swell of pride and hope. For once she wouldn’t spend the party in some shadowy corner of the living room reading, or in the kitchen washing dishes. Instead, she would be the center of her mother’s attention. This play would prove that Meredith had listened to every precious word Mom had ever said, even those few that were spoken softly, in the dark, at story time.