Sycamore (Chancellor)

Sycamore 
Bryn Chancellor, 2017
HarperCollins
336 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780062661098


Summary
A mesmerizing page-turner in the spirit of Everything I Never Told You and Olive Kitteridge.

Out for a hike one scorching afternoon in Sycamore, Arizona, a newcomer to town stumbles across what appear to be human remains embedded in the wall of a dry desert ravine.

As news of the discovery makes its way around town, Sycamore’s longtime residents fear the bones may belong to Jess Winters, the teenage girl who disappeared suddenly some eighteen years earlier, an unsolved mystery that has soaked into the porous rock of the town and haunted it ever since.

In the days it takes the authorities to make an identification, the residents rekindle stories, rumors, and recollections both painful and poignant as they revisit Jess’s troubled history. In resurrecting the past, the people of Sycamore will find clarity, unexpected possibility, and a way forward for their lives.

Skillfully interweaving multiple points of view, Bryn Chancellor knowingly maps the bloodlines of a community and the indelible characters at its heart—most notably Jess Winters, a thoughtful, promising adolescent poised on the threshold of adulthood.

Evocative and atmospheric, Sycamore is a coming-of-age story, a mystery, and a moving exploration of the elemental forces that drive human nature—desire, loneliness, grief, love, forgiveness, and hope—as witnessed through the inhabitants of one small Arizona town. (From the publisher.)

Author Bio
• Birth—ca. 1971-72
• Raised—Sedona, Arizona, USA
• Education—B.A., Northern Arizona University; M.A., Arizona State University; M.F.A., Vanderbilt University
• Awards—Prairie Schooner Book Prize
• Currently—lives in Charlotte, North Carolina


Bryn Chancellor, English professor and author, was born in California and raised in Arizona. She earned her B.A from Northern Arizona and her M.A. Arizona State, both in English. She received an M.F.A. in fiction from Vanderbilt University..

Chancellor's debut novel Sycamore was published in 2017, and her story collection When Are You Coming Home? in 2014. Other short fiction has appeared in Gulf Coast, Blackbird, Colorado Review, Crazyhorse, Phoebe, and elsewhere.

In 2014 Chancellor won the Prairie Schooner Book Prize for her story collection. Additional honors include the Poets & Writers Maureen Egen Writers Exchange Award in fiction, as well as literary fellowships from the Alabama State Council on the Arts and the Arizona Commission on the Arts.

Currently she is assistant professor of English at the University of North Carolina in Charlotte. She is married to artist Timothy Winkler. (Adapted from the author's website.)

Book Reviews
I cannot even begin to detail all the Sycamore folks I came to know in this rather literary thriller. There were a lot of lost souls and people starting over, which some readers might find a bit maudlin. But I loved every minute I spent with this book. Most every character was revealed in such an intimate way that I did not want to say goodbye, unusual in a thriller. I admired the closure that the author achieved, wrapping up so very many loose ends and difficult predicaments by book’s end. I even found comfort in a beautifully written scene describing the last minutes of Jess’s life. This is Chancellor's first novel …I sure hope she has more to come. READ MORE …
Keddy Ann Outlaw - LitLovers


Chancellor…deftly dissects the lives of more than a dozen characters who come into contact with Jess during the 12 months she lives in Sycamore. With a few opening words in each chapter, we’re immersed in their worlds and the hefty burdens of their years-long emotional struggle.… Chancellor creates suspense and tension in quiet, insular moments—family members brooding at the dinner table, lustful gazes, the rolled eyes of hormonal teenagers in the hallways of the local high school.
Atlanta Journal-Constitution


The novel glimmers with its author’s keen understanding of lives at all ages and stages. Which she achieves with deft characterization; few of her creations can be called minor, and all are drawn with care and compassion. At once haunting and hopeful, Sycamore displays Chancellor’s talent across all of fiction’s realms and showcases her generosity of spirit.… Powerful and moving.
Richmond Times-Dispatch


This hypnotic debut probes the disappearance of 17-year-old Jess.… Chancellor shifts nimbly between past and present and from character to character, cutting away the net of riddles that ensnares Sycamore’s residents.
Oprah magazine


[An] emotional and addicting debut…[and] unforgettable page‐turner.
RT Book Reviews


(Starred review.) [R]iveting…a movingly written, multivoiced novel examining how one tragic circumstance can sow doubt about fundamental things; as one character succinctly asks, "Do we really know anyone?"… [A] transporting vision of community, connection, and forgiveness.
Publishers Weekly


(Starred review.) Chancellor's absorbing first novel begins quietly, quickly gains momentum, and ends explosively.… Shifting deftly between 1991 and 2009, Chancellor spins multiple threads of Jess's story as it affects everyone, especially Maud.… [G]ripping. —Donna Bettencourt, Mesa Cty. P.L., Grand Junction, CO
Library Journal


A meaty, suspenseful debut.
Booklist


Though the author builds a fair amount of whodunit suspense, she clearly means for this to be a serious novel about loss, grieving, and forgiveness. Unfortunately, her writing—effortful and straining too hard for effect—often gets in the way…. [The] deft, plausible resolution…[is] not enough.
Kirkus Reviews

Discussion Questions
We'll add publisher questions if and when they're available; in the meantime, use our LitLovers talking points to start a discussion for Sycamore … then take off on your own:

1. In the opening chapter, Jessica Winters is new to Sycamore and having trouble adjusting to both her new home and her parents' divorce. Does author Bryn Chancellor portray teenage angst and anger convincingly? What do you think of her friendship with Dani? And Dani's father? Would his "interest" in Dani have been handled differently today?

2. What do you think of Maud as a mother? As a person? How do you consider the relationship between mother and daughter?

3. Another newcomer to Sycamore is Laura Drennan, also coming out of a failed marriage. She, of course, is the one who finds the remains, which sets the story in motion. Laura views her move to Sycamore as "an entire split from the past." She would  be happy to "burn the whole f***ing thing down and to see if she could rise from the ashes." What do you think of her?

4. Consider the town locals, some of them generations deep. What are their dreams and disappointments? Each of them — Iris Overton, Stevie Prentiss, Adam Newell, and Esther Genoways — is alone. How do they cope with the challenges in front of them? Do you find one character more engaging than others, perhaps?

5. (Follow-up to Question 4) What effect does/did Jessica Winter's disappearance have on the town? How has the mystery haunted the residents over nearly two decades? How does the possibility of finding her remains open up new wounds?

6. The author uses her individual characters to reveal different facets of Jessica and the mystery of her disappearance. How and what do we learn from each of the different characters?

7. Comparisons are being made of this book to Olive Kitteridge. Have you read Elizabeth Strout's book? Do you see any resemblances, if so what?

8. (Follow-up to Question 7) Did you enjoy the author's use of shifting perspectives? Or did you find the numerous characters hard to keep track of? What might be the advantage of incorporating different points of view in telling a story? What, on the other hand, might be the advantage of using a single narrative voice?

9. In what way does Sycamore, the town itself, function as a character? How does the author make use of the area's landscape and atmospherics to highlight the mystery at the heart of the novel?

10. Talk about the way the author ratchets up suspense. Were you surprised by the ending? Is the ending satisfying?

(Questions by LitLovers. Please feel free to use them, online or off, with attribution. Thanks.)

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