4. In trying to make sense of her world, Kyra learns about anterograde amnesia (difficulty storing new memories) and retrograde amnesia (difficulty retrieving old ones). Which, if you had to choose, would you prefer to have? Why?
5. Kyra narrates, “Just because someone talks about murder, doesn’t mean they intend to actually kill someone” . What do you think she means by this? In what circumstances do you believe you might have to consider killing someone? Would you do it? If so, how? Remember, it’s just a conversation starter!
6. Nancy says, “Couples get married for all kinds of reasons”. For what reason did Van and Nancy marry? For what reason did Kyra get married? What other reasons are there?
7. There are two marriages profiled on Mystic Island, Van and Nancy’s and Kyra and Jacob’s. How do the two marriages contrast? How do the members of the couples interact with each other (for instance, Van and Kyra, and Nancy and Jacob)? Would you feel comfortable hanging out with Nancy, if you were Kyra?
8. Kyra says, “We’re shaped by our past. The past makes us who we are”. And Jacob replies, “It influences us, but it doesn’t make us. We can do anything, be anyone”. With which of these two statements do you agree most wholeheartedly? Why?
9. Van once describes Kyra as “a woman with secrets”. What secrets was she keeping before she lost her memory? Does she have secrets at the end of the book?
10. During the dinner party at Van and Nancy’s, Nancy says, “The only way to protect ourselves is to stay offline”. Do you feel safer when you’re connected digitally? Or when you’re out of touch with the electronic world? What are the pros and cons of each?
11. At the inn, Waverly collects lunch boxes, and Jacob’s mother collected plants. Kyra collects information about sea life. What do their collections say about them? What do our collections say about us?
12. There are a lot of different homes in The Twilight Wife—Jacob and Kyra’s home on Mystic Island, the cottage in back of the house where Jacob writes, the old yellow Victorian on the bluff. What is the significance of home in the novel?
13. Mystic Island might sound like paradise to some and a nightmare to others—discuss who in the room would choose to live such an isolated life, and who would rather be closer to civilization.
1. Read The Soul of an Octopus by Sy Montgomery, one of the books that appears in Jacob and Kyra’s living room, to shed some light on the passion for marine life that Kyra retained even through her memory loss.
2. Kyra runs into a lot of people who knew her only briefly the previous summer, like Rachel Spignola and Doug Ingram, yet they all shed a little light on who she was. Take slips of paper and assign buddies, then take turns writing down a one-to-two-sentence description of who the other person is. What do you learn about yourself and each other?
3. As Kyra explores the island, the places she visits and certain objects also evoke memories—seashells, the contents of her purse, photographs, and the local shops, the inn, and coastal tide pools. Which places and objects evoke the strongest memories for you and why?
4. Have every member of your book club share with the group what their favorite element of the natural world is. Why does each person connect with that place or animal or phenomenon so strongly?
What significance does the title hold to the narrative? Is Kyra a twilight wife? What connotations does the word twilight have for you?
The word twilight suggests falling away into darkness, the strange, dreamlike in-between time, when day isn’t quite finished and night hasn’t quite begun. Kyra hovers in that limbo, not entirely herself without her memory and plunging into a terrifying night as her life unravels. However, she also finds beauty and hope in twilight. She remembers magical nights when she walked the beach and discovered unusual marine species beneath the moonlight. And night always becomes day again. Darkness leads to dawn. She discovers her own inner strength and reclaims her life.
How and when did you first come up with the conceit for the novel? What sparked the initial idea that became the book?