The Shadow Year (56 page)

Guilt and regret are powerful emotions and I seem to be drawn to writing about characters who suffer deeply from both. It’s probably because my stories pivot on dramatic moments and you can’t have characters doing extreme or questionable things without the inevitable ruminations over right and wrong. As a writer I like to explore the journey that has led a person to take dramatic action. It’s that whole idea of walking around in another person’s shoes in order to see the true picture of their life, more so than believing in a simplistic black-and-white version of right and wrong or good and bad. The grey areas of a person’s character are far more intriguing, don’t you think? It’s these areas that can bring that tremor of recognition and make us question our own values and beliefs: what would I do in this situation? Am I capable of such extreme behaviour?

SUGGESTED POINTS FOR DISCUSSION

• What is the significance of the title
The Shadow Year
? Does it have more than one possible interpretation? What are the shadows it refers to?

• Hannah Richell starts her story with a quote from Thoreau: ‘A lake is the landscape’s most beautiful and expressive feature. It is the Earth’s eye; looking into which the beholder measures the depth of his own nature.’ Thoreau believed that it is only by understanding nature that we can understand ourselves. Do you agree?

• The cottage and the lake are so important in
The Shadow Year
that they could almost be considered characters in their own right. Can you imagine this story taking place anywhere else (in Australia, New Zealand or Canada, for example), or could it only have been set in this particular landscape?

• Tom comments to Lila about the cottage’s eerie atmosphere: ‘There are just some places that feel . . . that feel as though something has happened there. I think this cottage might be one of them.’ Do you agree with Tom? Can places hold the echoes of the events that have taken place there?

• The story is told from two different perspectives and takes place in two different periods in time. Why might the author have chosen to present the story in this way? How does this create interest, and what challenges might it pose for the writer?

• The answer to this story’s final mystery is hidden in the prologue, though the reader doesn’t know it until the last chapter. As you read on, did you think back to the young woman in her nightgown stumbling down to the lake, and did you speculate about who she might be?

• We are nearly halfway through the book before we learn who Lila’s father was, and we don’t learn who her mother was until the end of the book. Did you start to put this together for yourself before it was revealed? Why do you think the author held this information back, and how did this shape your experience of the story and your feelings about the characters?

• When they first move to the cottage and throw themselves into the hard work of daily survival, Kat feels satisfied and happy, and looks back with regret on ‘all those wasted hours spent in lecture theatres . . . pondering the abstract ideas and philosophies of the world’. Is education ever wasted? How well did Kat’s education prepare her for the practical, ethical and moral dilemmas she soon faces?

• After the night of the magic mushrooms, Kat writes in her diary: ‘Of course we were all off our heads but still – some would say that’s when we become our true selves, let our real instincts take over.’ Do you agree with Kat? How responsible were any of them for the events of that night? Was anyone acting on their true instincts or were they all lost in the moment and blameless in light of their drug-taking?

• At a point within the novel, Kat considers her group of friends to be like ‘one unconventional, chaotic family’. Do you agree? If so, what familial roles do they each assume?

• As she is growing up, Simon tells Lila that she should ‘never trust a man who doesn’t read books’. Do you think this is good advice? Why or why not?

• Lila says she has always loved the pace and the buzz of London, but when she returns from the cottage she compares it unfavourably with the tranquillity of the lake, and thinks of the simple life William and Evelyn lead on their farm. She starts to wonder if her life on the lake is ‘real’, and London’s frenzy no more than an illusion. Is it easier to lead a virtuous or moral life in the countryside than in the city? Does a simple life build moral strength? If so, what went wrong with Simon’s experiment at the cottage?

• When she first comes home to London, for Christmas, Lila promises Tom that she won’t return to the cottage until things are better between them, but then she breaks that promise. Was she right to do so?

• For a time, Lila suspects that Tom may have been with her when she had her accident and lost their baby, and is keeping this fact hidden from her. Did you ever suspect him? Why or why not?

• Do you believe Kat is the only one to blame for the dual tragedies within the story? Is anyone else culpable? Is it possible – or appropriate – to apportion blame?

• Kat and Freya suffered tragic neglect as children. What effect did this have on their adult lives? Can Kat be held responsible for her mistakes, when her past is taken into account?

• Do you think Kat got the life she deserved?

• There are many animals in
The Shadow Year
, in particular a piglet who trots along behind Freya like a puppy and a lamb on William’s farm that is fed by Lila. What symbolism do some of the animals hold in the story? What ideas is the author exploring through them?

• At the end of their time at the cottage, Kat, Simon, Carla and Ben learn that they have never been in any danger of eviction. Does this knowledge change the value of their experiment? And if so, how? Was it wrong of Mac to withhold this information? Does this make him in any way responsible for the tragic events that follow?

• By the end of the story, Lila is pregnant again. Could it have ended satisfactorily if she was not?

• There are twin tragedies at the heart of this story, and a single character – Kat – is ultimately responsible for both of them. She asks for forgiveness for one, but her part in the other remains a secret. Does Kat deserve forgiveness when she is not ready to confess all of her sins?

• Themes of grief, blame and forgiveness are central to Hannah Richell’s first novel,
Secrets of the Tides
, and are also central to
The Shadow Year
. Do you think it is possible ever to exhaust these themes? Why or why not?

• What do the motifs of shadows and honesty, woven throughout the book, lend to the story?

FURTHER READING

The Poison Tree
– Erin Kelly

My Lover’s Lover
– Maggie O’Farrell

Gone Girl
– Gillian Flynn

Walden
– Henry David Thoreau

The Secret History
– Donna Tartt

Secrets of the Tides
– Hannah Richell

Also By Hannah Richell

Secrets of the Tides

Copyright

AN ORION EBOOK

First published in Great Britain in 2013 by Orion Books.
This ebook first published in 2013 by Orion Books.
Copyright © Hannah Richell 2013

The right of Hannah Richell to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All the characters in this book, except for those already in the public domain, are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior permission in writing of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published without a similar condition, including this condition, being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

ISBN: 978 1 4091 4300 0

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