Question A

[Jonetta]

Morgan is visited by Lena Oleander who wants her to handle her son’s appeal of his murder conviction. When she turns her down, Lena goes out to her van and commits suicide. Why did you think so at the time? Did your opinion of her motives change by the end of the book?

[Charlene]

I assumed that Lena and her husband were having big problems, but I did not know that it was more than her son's imprisonment. If she knew half of the story about the cash payment for their farm, all of which was mortgaged to the hilt for her son's defense, I think she knew the future was even more bleak.

[Jonetta]

I didn’t understand at all why at the beginning of the book. By the end, I understood that without her son and the prospect of continuing to live with her abusive and mean husband, Lena’s life looked awfully bleak. It made more sense then.