The Story She Left Behind

Encourage readers to connect the book’s themes and characters with their personal experiences.

1. How did you respond to the revelation that Bronwyn was alive and living in Cumbria? How did this plot point alter your sense of Clara’s story?

2. Compare and contrast Clara and Bronwyn’s and Clara and Wynnie’s relationships with your own maternal and/or familial relationships. Which facets of these mother-daughter dynamics are most and/or least relatable, and why?

3. Both Clara and Bronwyn identify as artists. Do you relate to Clara’s or Bronwyn’s creative practices more closely? Which aspects of their artistic lives are most resonant for you?

4. Clara develops a deep connection with Cumbria. Compare and contrast this setting and community to your own sense of home.

5. Discuss your responses to Clara and Charlie’s romance. How does their dynamic impact them as individuals? How does their relationship compare to your own romantic experiences?

Examine the book’s relevance to societal issues, historical events, or cultural themes.

1. Analyze the role of art in each of the female characters’ (e.g., Clara, Bronwyn, Eliza, Pippa, Wynnie, and Beatrix Potter) self-discovery journeys through a feminist lens. How do these representations relate to the novel’s subtextual themes about women’s liberation and rights to self-expression?

2. The novel is set between Bluffton, South Carolina; London, England; and Cumbria, England. Analyze how each setting shapes the overarching narrative mood. How do these settings impact Clara’s character as she journeys toward understanding and healing?

3. The novel is loosely based on the writer Barbara Newhall Follett’s life and story. Compare and contrast Follett’s actual story to Henry’s fictionalized rendition. What liberties has Henry taken? What are the thematic resonances of the resolutions that Henry offers to Bronwyn’s character, considering Follett’s unresolved fate?

4. How does Bronwyn’s forced hospitalization as a teenager mirror the historical use of psychiatry as a tool to control women perceived as deviating from societal norms? What resonances exist between the narrative and contemporary institutional, medical, or cultural forces that pathologize female autonomy, particularly as it relates to mental illness?

Dive into the book’s structure, characters, themes, and symbolism.

1. Henry writes the novel from various points of view. Analyze the formal, narrative, and thematic significance of each narrative vantage. How would The Story She Left Behind differ if the author wrote it from an alternate point of view?

2. The novel toggles between multiple temporal eras and geographical locations. How does this unconventional plot structure relate to Henry’s explorations of The Impact of the Past on the Present?

3. Compare and contrast Clara’s and Bronwyn’s characters. Are they foils for each other or mirrors? How do parallels between them capture The Indelible Bonds Between Mothers and Daughters? How do their differences relate to their individual character arcs?

4. Descriptions of the landscape and natural world abound throughout the novel. Analyze the significance of such passages. What does the natural world say about the characters’ internal worlds? How does the natural world relate to their artistic practices?