Reading the Chunksters discussion

I am, of course, being slightly late because my life seems to be currently totally unaware of any rest or R&R times.
Excuses aside, this is the thread to discuss the next four chapters.

1. In chapter 24, William is guilt-ridden and blames himself for his metaphorical blindness, but because a reader is expected to relate to William as a figurehead of this boo, so are we.
What are your feelings after the revelation in the previous part? Did you see this revelation coming? Did you suspect Foole? Did you suspect that Shade was at least nearby hiding in the shared past between William and Edward?
2. Has Foole fooled you as well?

3. Miss Utterson in her reply says the following, " Everything is about the dead." Did she literally mean this or was she talking about her story that had something to do about the past?

4. With the extensive excursuses that explore the past of our characters, I develop the feeling of attachment for Shade/Foole. The main characters - Foole and Pinkerton - are not turning into mortals enemies. Do you see them as the opposing forces ("He'd see Shade in shackles yet" or as an unlikely alliance in their quest for Charlotte?

5. Why did Sally Porter deceive William Pinkerton? The truth revealed in her letter might be quite unpleasant to acknowledge, but it was the truth nonetheless, and it could have been easily told during the personal meeting? Was she acting under the guidance of some mysterious person who controls what everyone thinks and how everyone acts?

Allan Pinkerton to Foole:

"There"s the family you're born to, and the family you make. It's the latter kind that lasts."

And here we see a comparison between William and Foole. William has his wife and children, and he confides only in his wife, as best I can tell, and never his father or mother or brother.

Foole kept losing the families he was "born" into, but he has made his own -- Japheth, Molly, Mrs. Sykes, and her daughter (and Charlotte too) and confides in only them. Only Japheth and Molly know his past. Will it prove more enduring than the ones he was born into?

Then Mrs. Sykes says the following:

"Go far enough back in any life, sir, an the same's true of all of us"
(. . .)

"I tell Hettie the past is writ, but tomorrow ain't never existed before."

Both William and Foole are trapped in what's writ, but Mrs. Sykes is, I think, telling Foole the future is the gateway to freedom if he makes the right decisions. She might as well be telling William the same thing. (There are those real and psychological prisons Dickens was so fond of.) As more and more of Foole's and William's pasts are revealed to us, it' becoming more and more obvious that their lives are very entangled.

Sally tells William in her letter that his father saw himself in young Foole and cared for him like a son. Wonder how William feels about that? It's almost as if Foole is the castaway illegitimate son and brother, doomed to live a very different life than his sibling. And then they meet. What will happen?

To be honest, I'm having trouble warming to William. Foole is one of my favorite characters. So who is the protagonist and who is the antagonist here?

Did Sally reveal all in her letter? Or is she withholding the worst?

Xan Shadowflutter wrote: ""There"s the family you're born to, and the family you make. It's the latter kind that lasts."

And here we see a comparison between William and Foole. William has his wife and children, and he confides only in his wife, as best I can tell, and never his father or mother or brother.."


You are so right. Behind the atmosphere, excellent dialogue, mystery, there is one theme that is very ubiquitous - family and the attachments and ties we form throughout our lives. What is a family? Whom do I call a family? What does a family mean to me? These are the questions that the characters seem to be exploring in this book.

Xan Shadowflutter wrote: "To be honest, I'm having trouble warming to William. Foole is one of my favorite characters. So who is the protagonist and who is the antagonist here?"

Foole is less unlikable as typical anti-heroes could be, but is he an anti-hero or another protagonist with the baggage?

Perhaps both William and Foole are protagonists and the antagonist is their histories. That is the conflict.

Here's something else: Foole and William each have moral codes, yet William will kill while Foole will not. William has a father, authoritarian and god-like. Foole has no father at all. William is raised in a good family, while Foole raises himself, surviving on the streets. William's life has order and a future he can clearly see. Foole's life is disordered and his future is always cloudy. Yet who is the brute? And who is the prisoner? And who leaves his family for long stretches, and who takes his family with him wherever he goes?

One more thing. Both are haunted by ghosts -- William by the memory of his father; Foole by the memory of Charlotte. Both yearn to be liberated from their pasts.

William is the brute and the one imprisoned by the strongest walls. He spends his life seeking the truth and chasing Edward Shade all the while forsaking time with his family and wife. He has no other real purpose than to hunt down Shade. He seems so black and white to me.

Foole on the other hand is part of the flash family and lives by his wits and crimes. I see a young boy who has never had a chance to experience the traditional family structure, yet he is more open to possibilities and hope.

Xan Shadowflutter wrote: "To be honest, I'm having trouble warming to William. Foole is one of my favorite characters. So who is the protagonist and who is the antagonist here?"

This is exactly how I am feeling at this point. Foole is definitely a more likeable character to me. It's definitely an interesting way to play the characters off one another, since William is supposed to be the "good guy" and Foole the criminal.

It definitely seems like the elder Pinkerton saw Shade as a son, and felt more than just the professional betrayal. It makes me wonder the reason why he was hunting Shade all this time... was it really to put him away? Or offer some kind of apology or reconciliation? Perhaps William saw it as a hunt for a criminal... but even then, it's all the more jarring now that he knows his father is the one who trained this particular criminal.

Don't we all fall for bad guys?

William does not apologize. Even when wrong he forces it through to the end. He sees what he wants to see. He's been given sufficient reason to question his father's relationship with Adam, and Adam's role in his father's life -- not only by what Foole has told him, which is suspect, but also by what Sally told him in her letter -- but his conditioning forces him to see a criminal, and all criminals are evil. But he may also be jealous of Foole because his father possibly showed more approval of him than himself, and that may be because Foole's youth is closer to Alan's youth than William's.

Zulfiya wrote: "Don't we all fall for bad guys?"

If the bad guy has some redeeming qualities. In Foole's case he took what life gave him and turned himself into a gentleman thief. Got to appreciate that.

Xan, I actually meant I wondered why Allen kept hunting him, not William. William _thought_ that his father was hunting Shade because he was a criminal and wanted to put him away. (view spoiler)[ Clearly at the end, we learn he's figured out the real reason, to protect Shade, but at the time I originally wrote the comment above I didn't know that yet). (hide spoiler)]

Yes, it's misdirection by the author. We are told Allen keeps receiving messages and stolen items from Shade. What else are we to believe at the time other than that Allen Pinkerton is chasing a thief? Yet, at the same time, we are also left wondering why Allen's obsession with Shade, possibly leading us to believe there is more to it than chasing an exceptional thief.