1) What might be significant about the cat being named after Winston Churchill? What about his nicknname, Church?
2) What is the family's relationship to religion in the novel? How might this contribute to or impact the horrors that follow?
3) Discuss with your partner whether you would be tempted to use the burial ground, if your loved one died and you had it at your disposal.
4) How do the different characters respond to Gage's death? What do their different responses tell us about how grief works?
5) Contrast Gage's death and Norma's death; look at the two different rituals (funerals, viewings) that each experience. How are these rituals designed to help people come to terms with death? In what ways do they fail to succeed in this?
6) Why does Timmy's dad (p 256, near end of chapter 38) think he has a right to bring him back?
7) Contrast Timmy with other zombies you might have seen in literature or film. How is his portrayal as a zombie different than a "stereotypical" zombie? What is the effect of his portrayal on the reader?
8) Timmy, the zombie, and Jud, the living being, both have a "twinkle in their eye" at certain points in time. For Timmy, it's after he comes back from the dead and asks a girl to "cut a rug;" for Jud, it's when he's lying to Louis about the burial ground and why he's taken him there to it. How do you interpret this twinkle? What does it mean?
2) What is the family's relationship to religion in the novel? How might this contribute to or impact the horrors that follow?
3) Discuss with your partner whether you would be tempted to use the burial ground, if your loved one died and you had it at your disposal.
4) How do the different characters respond to Gage's death? What do their different responses tell us about how grief works?
5) Contrast Gage's death and Norma's death; look at the two different rituals (funerals, viewings) that each experience. How are these rituals designed to help people come to terms with death? In what ways do they fail to succeed in this?
6) Why does Timmy's dad (p 256, near end of chapter 38) think he has a right to bring him back?
7) Contrast Timmy with other zombies you might have seen in literature or film. How is his portrayal as a zombie different than a "stereotypical" zombie? What is the effect of his portrayal on the reader?
8) Timmy, the zombie, and Jud, the living being, both have a "twinkle in their eye" at certain points in time. For Timmy, it's after he comes back from the dead and asks a girl to "cut a rug;" for Jud, it's when he's lying to Louis about the burial ground and why he's taken him there to it. How do you interpret this twinkle? What does it mean?
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