Storied Life of A.J. Fikry ~ Gabrielle Zeven ~ June Book Club Online

[PatH]

The Book Club Online is the oldest  book club on the Internet, begun in 1996, open to everyone.  We offer cordial discussions of one book a month,  24/7 and  enjoy the company of readers from all over the world.  Everyone is welcome.

June Book Club Online - Starts June 6

Storied Life of A.J. Fikry
by Gabrielle Zeven

You'll fall in love with Fikry, who owns a bookstore.  Does he have a future?  Will there be any bookstores in the future? Let's discuss it! Join us in June.  This book is perfect for the lovely month of June, you'll laugh!  Yes, you will - OUTLOUD - We did. If you are interested please post, we will post our discussion schedule shortly. SCHEDULE JUNE 6-12  CHAPTERS 1-3 QUESTIONS, CHAPTERS 1-3. 1. Would you have liked AJ's bookstore? Do you know one like it? What do you like in a bookstore? 2. Based on the synopsis, how does each short story relate to the chapter it heads? If you've read any of the stories, did the synopsis give a good impression of it? 3, How do you react to AJ's pronouncements on books? 4. When his wife died, people avoided the bookstore. When Maya came, they flocked to it. Is that realistic? 5. Was Maya's mother right to want her to grow up in a bookstore? Do you agree that where you grow up determines who you are? 6. Is the portrayal of the baby Maya realistic? 7. Do you agree on the "necessity of encountering stories at precisely the right time in our lives."

Discussion Leaders: Joan K and Pat H

[JoanK]

LEAH: thanks for telling us what you read.

As a mystery fan, I'm embarrassed I don't know Tanya French. Here she is:

https://www.fantasticfiction.com/f/tana-french/

Come over to mysteries and tell us about her. Ignore the old posts, just jump in.

http://seniorlearn.org/forum/index.php?topic=807.8160

[JoanK]

BARB: good for you, reading short stories. I'm like most of you: I like them when I read them, but don't think to.

One thing: short stories are a good way to get an introduction to some of the literary giants: you know, the authors we feel we "ought to" read, but don't. Tolstoy, Thomas Mann, henry James, James Joyce all wrote great short stories. (Hmm, no women in there. Jane Austen wrote a novella. Flannery O'Conner of "A Good Man is Hard to Find." wrote only short stories.)

[PatH]

Ursula K. LeGuin wrote a number of good short stories.

[bellamarie]

I actually like short stories.  I cut my teeth on the short stories in  Reader's Digest. 

Barb, what a neat thing to have a short story weekly in your email box.  I will have to check out that link.

Egads, and goodness gracious, I thought I had purchased The Storied Life of A. J. Fikry on my ipad and went to begin reading chapters 1-3 only to find I had actually borrowed from my library online.  I went to my local library yesterday and they are tracking me down a copy.  I really don't like to pay for books much anymore, if anything I wait til they have a book sale $1.00 for a bag of used books and then stock up.  I did go to Barnes & Noble last month and buy a few off their discounted shelves as well.  No fear, I will be ready to join in tomorrow!

[JoanK]

It will be June 6 soon on the East coast, so I'll take the opportunity now to welcome you all to the discussion.

There's a lot to talk about: where to start? What about the format: each chapter named after a short story. What is the author trying to do here?

There are other questions in the heading. Or talk about whatever you want.

[JoanK]

BELLAMARIE: don't worry if the mix-up makes you a little late. We'll be here.

[Frybabe]

Q&A:

4. When his wife died, people avoided the bookstore. When Maya came, they flocked to it. Is that realistic?
Yes, I think it is somewhat realistic, at least regarding the local, year-round community. Once the news got around about how Fikry ended up with a baby, curiousity would have drawn some of them. Others, especially the women, would have wanted to be helpful by offering (not necessarily wanted or asked for) advice for taking care of Maya. That need to be helpful would have been all that much stronger because Fikry was a bachelor and had no experience with babies.

5. Was Maya's mother right to want her to grow up in a bookstore? Do you agree that where you grow up determines who you are?
While I agree can admire Maya's mother wanting her child to grow up in a bookstore, she was taking a very big risk. Fikry could have chosen to turn her over to child welfare. In fact, I am surprised that they didn't take her until they had vetted Fikry. Growing up in a bookstore (or anywhere else for that matter) certainly has advantages, but it does not necessarily mean that it will ultimately determine who you are. This is the nature vs nurture argument. I believe both play a role in determining the future you.

[PatH]

Frybabe:

In fact, I am surprised that they didn't take her until they had vetted Fikry.

I agree with you there.  Knowing that The Fall of the House of Usher is a bad example doesn't make you a suitable foster parent.

[Mkaren557]

Let me start out by saying that I love bookstores.  I like Barnes and Noble, the book section in Sam's Club, and even online bookstores like Amazon where I buy too many books. I love novels that revolve around a bookstore.  I just finished The Readers of Broken Wheel Recommend, which I do recommend heartily.  I would go to AJ Fikry's bookstore because it is my favorite kind: small and in a small town.  It really it a character in this novel and the author develops this "character" as she might any other.  At the outset the bookstore is sad place which is not very welcoming, just like AJ himself.  I don't want to give anything away so I think I will just leave it there.  I will enjoy tracing the "character" of the bookstore as we read or reread this amazing book.
I am a fan of very long novels like Middlemarch, and And the Ladies of the Club, so I have never been a fan of short stories.  They end too soon and the characters go away before I really know them.  I plan to give them another chance and read the ones at the beginning of each chapter out of curiosity about how they fit in. 
Whoever chose this book, thank you.  It is a winner in my eyes.
   

[PatH]

Mostly short stories are best at making a single point.  Links to Lamb to the Slaughter and The Luck of Roaring Camp are in post #31.  Here's The Diamond as Big as the Ritz, as well as some other of Fitzgerald's stories.  You have to scroll down to get to words.

The Diamond as Big as the Ritz

[mabel1015j]

I like all bookstores, altho I seldom buy books for myself, I buy books as gifts.
Since about age eight I have been a library hound, having been the child of parents who lived through the Depression. (Altho I think my parents would have been very tight with a penny even if there had been no depression. And why would they buy a book that was available for free a mile down the street?) I have always told my children and students "libraries are the best thing in the culture that costs you nothing! "

Most books I buy are non-fiction, mostly women's history now, when i taught history I bought books that I wanted to use as resources. But I still love to go into bookstores of all kinds, including, yes, online. I am now a hound for the "free" books on Amazon.

Yes, I think it makes sense that people would not come into the store after Nic died, A. J. was not of their community, apparently not a pleasant person to try to talk to, and they may not have known what to say about Nic's having died. A baby, especially a cute baby, on the other hand, is much more inviting, especially for those people who wonder how A J is taking care of her and for caregiver-types who want to help.

I do think the writer may have not been clear about this 25-month old's behavior. Sometimes Maya is very precocious and then A J and Ismay put cushions all around her to feed her as though she can't sit up by herself. That struck me as odd. It also seemed strange to me that they allowed the child to stay with A J, but then it may just be smalltown USA and/or just convenience - who wanted to make that boat trip to do all that investigating and paperwork? Also, this IS a fiction story!

There's also an incongruence for me as to why A J wants to own a bookstore. If he wants it to be his liveihood, he doesn't do a very good job of getting and keeping customers. Yes, he loves books, maybe he should have been a librarian! Maybe I missed something.

Will be back.

Jean

[JeanneP]

I have the storied Life if A.J Fikry" on hold at the library. Will pick it up tomorrow if in and maybe be able to catch up with others reading it.

[PatH]

Great, JeanneP.  The first section is short, and the book is a fast read, so you should be able to catch up.

Agreed, Jean, Maya is inconsistent, and the spoon-feeding and pillows seem the least likely.

It was Fikry's now-dead wife Nic who really wanted to start the bookstore, and added a lot, though Fikry wanted it too.  When we first meet him, he's still a mess from the loss of Nic, drinking too much and not coping very well, hasn't yet found his way of running the store solo.  I like the idea of the store as a character; we'll see how it develops.

[nlhome]

I have two granddaughters who by age 23 months were talking sentences and had opinions, yet they both needed booster chairs for eating - sounds like there was not one available here - and their motor skills were not developed to the same age as their verbal and thinking skills. I wondered about Maya, then thought that if her mother talked to her like my older granddaughter's mother talked to her (constantly, in adult sentences) and asked for responses, it's not so unlikely. Our grandson, on the other hand, talks very little but he was building towers and houses out of Duplos by 18 months when the granddaughter his same age was still taking them out of one box and putting them in another.

I forget the word I want, but the idea of a child growing up in a book store is appealing and is the author's way of developing the plot and characters, just as tying something about each story into the chapter is another device the author uses. It's a puzzle, in a way.

[JoanK]

FRY: yes, nature versus nurture.  of course, whenever my kids do something I don't like, I think it's the fault of how I raised them. But they were diffewrent from day one.

MKAREN: The bookstore  "really it a character in this novel and the author develops this "character" as she might any other."

That's great! I hadn't thought of that, but of course you're right.

I agree with Nhome and JEAN (MABEL) that Maya as a 25 month old doesn't make sense. She would have been walking and, if healthy, been all over the place, instead of sitting like a lump. We have to conclude that the author is not around young children.

Like Jean, Pat and I started out life as library hounds, since our mother had been a children's librarian. Older, however, I've developed a sensitivity to the smell of mildew that often hangs around libraries, and can't enjoy them as I used to. The same with used bookstores, which I used to love. I still get many more books at the library, but I can't enjoy browsing as I used to.

[JoanK]

MKAREN: "Whoever chose this book, thank you."

That would be our ELLA, who unfortunately couldn't lead it. We all look forward to her return.

[Leah]

My husband is quick to notice while I'm watching a cop show/mystery on, say, Netflix, that I tend to focus on things that are not being portrayed realistically, or might be too much of a stretch. I point to the many recent shows that put an emphasis on crime forensics specialists and their detailed and relentless pursuit of the "scientific" that feeds the action. I can't seem to help myself.

But as I have been reading A.J., I realized that I haven't held it to the same standard; and that seems to be my tendency when reading fiction. I am more willing to suspend my disbelief. Hmmm! Wherever happenings haven't met my usual reality test, as seems to happen often in A.J.'s world, I seem to set reality aside and allow myself to fly into his world and find a bookshelf to hang out on. *8:>) 

Realistic or not, I see a number of "truths" as I read:
"once a person gives a shit about any one thing, he finds he has to start giving a shit about everything" (p. 76). I felt this gave me insight as to how A.J. gradually becomes more immersed in the community. It may also have something to do with the softening of his attitude towards Elmo, that "most annoying thing." It made me  hopeful that such immersion can replace contempt and judgment with love, tolerance, acceptance, and even reconciliation.

These two, said perfectly what I have never been able to put into words when relationships have gone astray or just reached their natural end:
"...some people weren't meant to be in your life forever" (p. 64)
and
"How little he had meant to Harvey and how much Harvey had meant to him." (pg 19).
Sad songs...

And I think this says a lot about A.J.'s life-immersion in fiction: "...but he doesn't believe in random acts. He is a reader, and what he believes in is narrative construction."  I am guessing that by now he recognizes that Maya's appearance is no narrative construction.
I am all over the map, here. Hope some of this strikes a chord.
So many thoughts are bubbling up - I feel "at least carbonated" (p.76) myself. And I love it!

[Leah]

NLHOME: I was curious about your mention of 'devices' an author might use so I went surfing. It's like a list of power tools! (Now back to reading A.J. (:
There are a gazillion of literary devices listed/defined at http://literarydevices.net/
Frame story is a story set within a story, narrative or movie told by the main or the supporting character. It occurs within the story or the movie or the narrative and audience comes across it when reading a book or watching a movie. A character starts telling a story to other characters, he would sit down and write a story. This technique is called a frame narrative, or frame story. It is a very popular form of literary technique employed in storytelling and narration. It usually is found in novels, plays, poems, television, films, musicals and opera. It is a unifying tale within which one or more related stories appear. For instance, in Homer’s Odyssey, Odysseus tells about his wandering experience in the court of King Alcinous, or his visit to the island of a sorcerer.

[nlhome]

Goodness, Leah, that's quite a list of "devices"! Interesting to consider. I remember many from my English student years.

[Ella Gibbons]

A bookstore?  Barnes and Noble is the only choice we have and I browse there, buy a sandwich and read awhile.  It is near me and is a treat to drive there and, of course, libraries, the most pleasant place I can think of to spend time.  Our big Andrew Carnegie library has been under renovation for a year and a half and I'm most anxious to find out what they have done with it.  I imagine more technology?  I

Fikry was a cold, snobbish person and a sad person because of the death of his wife who had started the bookstore; but then Maya came into his life. A child, a baby, and love can do wonders! to a cold heart.

"....novels have ruined Amelia for real men."  My sisters used to say that about me, I always had a book to read somewhere near me wherever I went.  I married a man who had never read for pleasure, but he listened at times to my stories about my books and eventually I found books on explorers that he liked.  "Every book is a World." 

 

[Frybabe]

Leah, your explanation of "frame story" brought Cloud Atlas immediately to my mind.

Ella,

"....novels have ruined Amelia for real men."

I remember, long ago, of us girls being cautioned against being too picky and holding up all the guys to some ideal man, the White Knight. Nowadays, White Knight Syndrome is applied to guys who have a overly strong need to rescue women from some need (real or perceived).

Also, Ella, good on finding books about explorers that your husband to read. My mom had a particular interest in Shackleton's Antarctic expeditions. Mom said she had a relative who crewed with an expedition to the Arctic, or so I thought she said, so I don't know why she was so interested in Shackleton in particular. An interesting tidbit of family history that I didn't pay a whole lot of attention to at the time. Now that she is gone, as with when Dad passed, we children have family history questions that are likely to go unanswered.

[Ella Gibbons]

Think I need a bit of help here; an explanation of the short story and its relation to the book.  I read Lamb to the Slaughter; now what is the connection? 

"You remember fun, right" Nic, Fikry's wife had once asked.  "Dimly,.....back when I had my weekends and my nights to myself, back when I read for pleasure." Fikrey answered.  (p.25)

What is fun?  Different for everyone;  I had one sister I used to laugh a lot with, that was fun. I suppose when I was young and single dates were fun?  Can't remember.  Isn't it funny but I don't consider reading fun.  It's a pleasure, a delightful way to spend time, to relax, but fun?  Fun to me has to be with other people.

[bellamarie]

I finally got a second to sit and read the first chapter and boy do I feel sad.  A.J. was so very rude to Amellia, and for me I sense it's because he has decided to dwell in his mourning and alcohol.  Twenty-one months he has been a widower, and it seems he has not reconnected to the world outside his bookstore.  As much as he says he does not like novels, he seems to have made his life just that.  When talking to the officer he speaks as if he is going through the chapters of a Danielle Steele novel.  This author has surely grappled with my emotions in this first chapter.  A pregnant, youthful, wife who seems has everything to live for, and then dies in an auto accident.  Ughhhh..... and now A.J. is getting drunk and visualizes her voice and appearance.  It's as though A.J. is living in a numb state.  He takes us back to a time he did have fun:  pg. 43 (ipad)

"You remember fun, right?"  "Dimly,"  he had said.  "Long ago, back before I was a bookseller, back when I had my weekends and my nights to myself, back when I read for pleasure, I recall that there was fun.  So, dimly, dimly. Yes."  "Let me refresh you memory.  Fun is having a smart, pretty, easy wife with whom you get to spend every working day."

Ella, we were posting at the same time about the same thing.  Now that is funny!   I do find reading fun, like A.J. mentions, although I think he is more or less remembering what he found as fun to him back then.  Fun can be different for each individual, and when I can curl up with my favorite afghan, cup of tea, dog snuggled by my feet with a good book...... that is my fun!  I don't necessarily need others around me to feel like I am having fun.  A.J. is reminiscing about the easy, fun filled, in love, no cares kind of days.  Now of course he has his life of loneliness and the responsibility of running Amelia's dream bookstore all by himself, except Molly.  I think it shocks him to find out it mattered to him Harvey had died, even though he never saw him as a person of significance or a friend.  Isn't it odd how we can not see how a person has a significance in our lives until they are no longer there?

On to chapter 2......

[mabel1015j]

Just a thought - Bellemarie pointed out a fact that I had forgotten - Nic has been dead for 21 months; Maya, it is pointedly mentions is 25 months old. May mean nothing, but it just struck me, why the specificity of those two periods of time? Is that important? Just musing.

Yes, reading is fun for me! I can empathize with, delight in, muse about other people's lives and other times. Those are some of the delights I have also had in studying history. Being retired allows me to indulge in fun reading, i thought of that immediately when A J made the comment about having weekends and nights to himself - I "said" to him "that time will come to you again when you retire." 

Jean

[bellamarie]

I had to laugh at reading, "....novels have ruined Amelia for real men."

I was so terribly guilty of reading romance novels when I first got married.  I have more Danielle Steele books than I care to admit, and the Harlequin romance novels.  They were nice and short, and even though I knew where these stories were going to end, I was hooked. 

Ella, I love our Barnes and Noble, every Friday after I do my volunteer work at Heartbeat of Toledo, my hubby and I go across the street to our mall and eat lunch at Barnes and Noble and sit and browse through books we think we might like to buy.  They have the best discounted shelves of all genres of books.

Jean, interesting point on the timeline here.  Yes, now that I am retired I can read into the wee hours of the night and sleep in a bit in the morning if I like.  Now to me..... that is fun!!!   I sense he will contact Amellia again since he realizes how badly he treated her, and he will need to purchase more books for his customers whether he likes them or not.  Imagine if a bookstore carried ONLY the type of books just the owner read.  Now that would not seem like a recipe for success.

[Leah]

I'm with you, ELLA - I'm not picking up on much significance of the short stories associated with each chapter.
Anybody?

[Mkaren557]

The Luck at Roaring Camp certainly connects with Maya and her impact on the bookstore and many of the people that frequent it.  I did enjoy the first two short stories , but the connection is not so clear to me.

[JoanK]

So much to think about, just in these first three chapters. Now THIS is fun.

I've been thinking and thinking about the relevance of the short stories. LEAH gave a new idea: Filkry as a frame story to get us to appreciate the short stories?

But there has to be some relevance of the stories to the novel. What do you think? Who is the "Lamb to the Slaughter"? (I promise you, no one gets murdered in the book).

Speaking of murder, LEAH also brings up a point I was thinking of bringing up  in the Mystery discussion. Does it spoil the mystery if the very clever, original method of murder would never have worked in real life? I admit, if the method is clever enough to be "fun" (that word again), I give it a pass. (And I give Agatha Christie an automatic pass. Half of her methods just wouldn't have a chance, but, well, she's Agatha Christie).

[BarbStAubrey]

I loved seeing the comment - I think from Leah - about the various techniques used to tell a story - I copied the link and it is right in line with my recently ordering and receiving "The Garden of Eloquence: A Rhetorical Bestiary" which a version has been around since Shakespeare's time - seems he used The Garden of Eloquence: as a menu to write his plays.

[JoanK]

MKAREN: we were posting at the same time. Yes, "The Luck" seems to parallel the book. I haven't read the second story yet. What do you all think of it?

[JoanK]

JEAN brings up another good question: 21 months, 25 months? Odd, especially calling a baby 25 months old, instead of two years.

[PatH]

Leah:

I'm not picking up on much significance of the short stories associated with each chapter.

The relevance seems to vary a lot.  The Luck of Roaring Camp is a parallel situation to that in the book--unsuitable characters suddenly taking responsibility for a child--though let's hope the ending is different.

Lamb to the Slaughter has the parallel situation of someone calling police to their house, and serves as part of the conversation in which Fikry and Lambiase get to know each other, but is otherwise quite different.

 Lambiase is skeptical of the possibility of cooking the frozen lamb in time, but I think it's possible.  It's hours before the police sit down to eat it, and you don't have to marinate it first.  It might not be very good, but they had to remind her it was in the oven, so it's understandable if it isn't very good.

[PatH]

I was posting at the same time too.

[PatH]

Speaking of murder, LEAH also brings up a point I was thinking of bringing up  in the Mystery discussion. Does it spoil the mystery if the very clever, original method of murder would never have worked in real life? I admit, if the method is clever enough to be "fun" (that word again), I give it a pass. (And I give Agatha Christie an automatic pass. Half of her methods just wouldn't have a chance, but, well, she's Agatha Christie).

Do you remember in The ABC Murders when a character playing in a chess tournament quietly slumps over, dead, during the game?  It turns out that the murderer had wired the board so that when the victim made a certain move, he would complete a circuit and be electrocuted?  No crackle, no burned flesh, no jerking around, as electrocuted bodies do.

Yes, we give Christie a pass.

[Leah]

I keep wondering about the 21/25 month timeline - Nic was 2 months pregnant (since November) when she died 21 months ago which places the accident in January ("Massachusetts roads in winter"); A.J. Bought the Tamerlane collectible a year ago, a couple of months (March) after she died. He kept it on display in the bookstore all summer before the October when it disappears. The investigation "lasts a month," and 25-month old Maya appears in mid-December ("Two Fridays before Christmas"). 25 months earlier would have been in December when Nic was just one month pregnant. [OK, in my 'narrative construction': Maybe synchronicity had the two mothers-to-be (Nic and Maya's mother) intersect at this time and that is how Maya's mother knew about the bookstore and its book-loving owners.]

Oy vey!      This kind of mental gymnastics has GOT to be better than Luminosity quizzes!

Absence seizure - could he have moved the book during an episode?

[Leah]

I know - the book part doesn't fit in with my imaginings! Oh, well! 

[mabel1015j]

Wow! Leah! You have a real detail mind that would make for a great detective! 

Jean

[bellamarie]

Leah, you have me all over the place with your timelines.  So here is another little twister: 

"Mr. Fikry, was Tamerlane insured?"  A.J. puts his head in his hands.  Lambiase takes that to mean that the book wasn't.  "I only found the book about a year ago, a couple of months after my wife died.   pg. 51 (ipad)

So earlier we are told it was 21 months, now it's what a year ago?

PatH., Yes, I saw the comparison of the leg of lamb and the officer's coming to question the wife, with the dialogue with A.J. and Officer Lambiase.

The Diamond as Big as the Ritz I think signifies the valuable Tamerlane book he kept locked in the glass case, as Braddock inherited the diamond and a large number of slaves from his father, as well as the mission of keeping the diamond hidden. Percy explains that the diamond is the mountain on which their house rests.  Three years after his father's death, Braddock decides that they have enough wealth to last, roughly speaking, forever. He seals up the mine and sets his sights on forever concealing the diamond mountain
http://www.shmoop.com/diamond-as-big-as-ritz/section-4-summary.html

A.J. is realizing the money he wanted to get for the sale of the book is no longer an option for his future happiness when he planned on selling the bookstore, so much like Braddock, he has to be content with what he has.

I think the author had a little fun finding short stories to place in his chapters.  It is a bit like hide n seek figuring out the significance of them in the chapters.

[JoanK]

"...but he doesn't believe in random acts. He is a reader, and what he believes in is narrative construction." Is the writer warning us that this book is more elaborately constructed than seems on the surface? I'm beginning to suspect so.

Or is this a statement about life?

And I still think that either AJ or the publisher's rep is a lamb to the slaughter. But which?

By the way: what do you think of books as collectable objects, whose price depends on rarity and condition, not on the worth of the contents, like Tamberlane?

And what do you think of AJ's opinion of books. To him, they seem to be either trash, or wonderful. It really got on my nerves at first.