Discussion Topics
1. A Painted House calls attention to the ways people construct "us" and "them". How many distinct social groups can you identify in the novel? Think in terms of wealth, ethnicity, religion, geographic background, and any other social differences that seem relevant. Which groups do the Chandlers belong to? What do Luke and the other Chandlers think of those groups, and how do they view the groups they don't belong to?
2. Which of the novel's marriages, affairs, and infatuations cross the boundaries between social groups? How do the social differences involved in those relationships complicate or otherwise affect them?
3. Imagine A Painted House without baseball. How would it have been different? What does baseball do in this novel?
4. Only after the Chandlers are facing financial disaster do they reach some consensus that they should paint their house. Given everything that Luke has told us up to that point, how can we account for that decision?
5. What secrets does Luke have to keep? What ideas about secret-keeping do the characters express? What effect does Luke's secret-keeping have on him?
6. Although Luke narrates the novel in the past tense, we never learn if Ricky eventually returns home safely. What other issues does the novel leave unresolved? What difference does it make that those issues remain unsettled?
7. Listen to a National Public Radio interview with John Grisham about A Painted House, at http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1118204. (Be sure that you have RealPlayer installed.) How does the interview illuminate the novel?
8. Watch the Hallmark Hall of Fame made-for-television movie A Painted House, narrated by John Grisham. How does the film (which was directed by Alfonso Arau, with a teleplay by Patrick Sheane Duncan) differ from the novel on which it is based? How do you rate this adaptation?
9. Using resources available from the MSU Libraries' website (http://library.msstate.edu), find five newspaper or magazine reviews of A Painted House. Do you agree with their assessments of the book? Why or why not?