For those wanting to participate in this month’s book club discussion for “The Light of the Fireflies,” you can find the discussion HERE. Feel free to share your thoughts of the book on the Facebook page.
Since this is the first book club, we’re making this open to anyone who’s read the book to comment on the book. So if you haven’t finished reading it yet, no problem. It will remain on the PW Facebook page.
Also, you can comment on the book here if you don’t have Facebook.
Here is the original Facebook discussion and my responses to kick the book club off.
“The Light of the Fireflies” by Paul Pen Discussion Thread.
Hello everyone.
My name is Michelle Kenneth and I’ll be moderating our first book club discussion for Paul Pen’s “The Light of the Fireflies.” This is an Amazon Kindle First book, so if you subscribe to Amazon Prime, you get early access to the book before it is released for FREE. On the first day of every month, they release a group of selections that you can choose from.
For March, I selected Paul Pen’s book. I’ll be selecting the next book tomorrow after they release their selections. [In the future, as we get more interest in the Book Club, I’ll let someone else pick out the next month’s selection.]
So on to the discussion…
1) What did you think of the book?
2) Were you shocked by the ending of the book?
3) When they revealed who the father of the child was, were you surprised at this revelation? Did you assume the baby’s father was who the sister claimed the baby’s Father was?
4) What did you think of the real story of how they ended up in the basement and how they attained their burns?
5) As the boy tells the story from his point of view, he knows his brother is just a little off, but never to the extent we see in the back story. Based on what is revealed in the back story, did you imagine that the brother could be dangerous to society?
6) Overall, what were your thoughts on the book? Would you recommend it to your friends/family?
Diary of a Perfectionist Wannabe: I’ll start the discussion off…
1) Simply put, I did not like the book at all. Generally speaking, the incest involved and the elements of what the brother did to that girl…just not something I would normally read.
2) I was shocked by the ending of the book. I think as a woman, I’m generally concerned for the safety and well being of other women. I assumed the sister was the victim in this, sexually abused by her father. I never imagined she was actually a very bad seed. She was just altogether evil. Did she deserve getting knocked up by her brother? Was that some sort of justice? I don’t think it was. At the end, when she is killed, I thought it was a saving grace for everyone. They were safe from her torment, and she finally escaped her family.
3) I assumed the entire time the father was the father of her child. I never even imagined it was the brother that had knocked her up.
4) I really didn’t like their back story. This family was absolutely crazy. If they had called the police to begin with, they never would have gone into that basement. They never would have received those burns. I’m sure the town would have taken into account that the child had a mental disability. He didn’t report that he had found the girl because he did not know he was supposed to do that. Sure, there may have been villagers talking about how the kid sexually assaulted the girl while she was broken, but they could always move and start over. Why hide the corpse? The boy just didn’t know better. The Sister, she was evil within herself. She would have been better off leaving her family, especially after the way they ‘saved’ the boy the way they did.
The next question is…would you have followed in their footsteps or would you have called the police to save your disabled son?
5) I was very shocked when I read what the Brother did to the girl. It was just difficult to fathom he was a sexual deviant. Then to find out he had sex with his sister…I have to ask how that happened. She seems to fight well for herself. Was she raped? Did he have sex with her while she was asleep? How did he do it? It’s obvious she hates her brother and always has. How was he able to take advantage of her?
If you were in the Sister’s shoes, would you have tried to kill the baby, too? Personally, I don’t even want to think about being in her shoes.
I also could not imagine that the Brother was a danger to society. Part of me thinks that the family just made one too many wrong decisions in an attempt to ‘save’ their favorite son, thus making the situation out worse than it really was. It’s not like the boy killed the girl (or did he)?
6) Overall, I didn’t like the book. I assumed that the reason why they were all in there was because of some nuclear attack or apocalyptic happening…or maybe they wanted to be rid of society that judged them for their appearance after a fire. To find out why they went down into that basement…come on. They were a family of cowards.
Would I recommend this book to anyone? No. Just because it’s not my type of book. A lot of people on GoodReads recommend the book, even though it is very dark.
This book is so haunting it will stick with you for life just because of the disturbing images throughout the book. All throughout the book, I kept wondering how in the world the author came up with this idea.
As we go along and make this a regular book club, we’ll change how the book club is done, so make sure to sign up with your email to join the PW Book Club on the right hand side. Also, as more people join, I’ll let others pick out the next month’s Amazon Kindle First book on the first of the month.
I’ll be announcing next month’s Kindle First book tomorrow.
For those who don’t know what Kindle First is, you can read more about it HERE.