Confessions of the Fox

Confessions is full of intimate sexual imagery and detail. How does sex function in the text? What themes are these scenes in conversation with?

How are Sullivan and Wild alike? How are they different? What do the novel’s frequent meditations on the history of law and property suggest connects these two?

Why does Rosenberg give meta-commentary via Voth’s footnotes on his decision to make key characters in Jack’s life non-white? How does Rosenberg’s decision to include people of color in 18th-century London push back against ideas about the time period?

Voth’s present-day is highly dystopian and satirical, with a “Dean of Surveillance” running his university from the shadows, doing the bidding of an enormous military-pharmaceutical corporation. How does the novel comment on the present state of academia, and how does Voth’s position as an academic laborer parallel that of Jack as an indentured servant of Kneebone?

How do Jack and Bess approach the issue of the strength gravel? What reasons do they give for their different approaches?

Does the revelation that the Sheppard manuscript has been edited by dozens of people over the centuries make the manuscript more or less valuable? Why? How does this knowledge shape your perception of the story?

Why does Rosenberg begin with Jack’s “death”? What conventions and ideas about historical fiction is Rosenberg playing with in order to upend reader expectations at the end of the novel?

Why do the commodities speak to Jack? What would cause them to pick a thief to speak to? What does Voth believe is the cause behind the commodities speaking?