Secret Life of CeeCee Wilkes (Chamberlain) - Discussion Questions

Discussion Questions
1. CeeCee made a terrible mistake as a teenager, yet that mistake gave her a beloved daughter in Corinne. Did you do anything in your younger years that you deeply regret? (You don’t need to reveal what it was!) Did anything good come from it, and if so, how does that impact your feeling of regret?

2. CeeCee was smart and level headed. What elements conspired to allow her to help Tim in his plot to kidnap Genevieve Russell? Was there any point in your life when you might have been similarly seduced?

3. Did you feel sympathy toward CeeCee as a teenager? What other emotions did you feel toward her and why?

4. How did you feel about CeeCee’s mother leaving the letters for her?

5. Discuss CeeCee’s (and young Eve’s) self-esteem issues. What do you think created them and how do they play into her actions?

6. How would you describe Eve as a mother of the infant Cory? Of the adult Cory?

7. How do you feel about Jack as a husband and father? What did you like about him? Dislike?

8. Corinne had many fears and phobias. What do you think was the genesis of those fears?

9. Why do you think Eve made the choice she did when she learned of Tim’s conviction? Would you have made the same choice? Why or why not?

10. How would you have felt in Corinne’s place when she learned of her mother’s deception?

11. How do you feel about family secrets? Would the big secrets in this family–Eve’s actual identity and Corinne’s kidnapping–have been better left alone?
(Questions from the author's website.)

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