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About The Book

TOGETHER THEY FOUND THE ONE THING THAT ELUDED THEM AS INDIVIDUALS: A PLACE IN THE WORLD.

Reading Group Guide

This reading group guide for Miss Dreamsville and the Collier County Women's Literary Society includes an introduction, discussion questions, and ideas for enhancing your book club. The suggested questions are intended to help your reading group find new and interesting angles and topics for your discussion. We hope that these ideas will enrich your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book.


Introduction

When Boston-bred Jackie Hart sweeps into sleepy Collier County like a late-afternoon storm on the Gulf, young divorcee Dora has a feeling her life is about to change. Jackie immediately forms the Collier County Women’s Literary Society, and, for the first time in her life, Dora feels she has found her place in the world. The 1960s is a time of shifting perspectives and dramatic change, and as these changes creep slowly into Collier County, Mark, Dora and her small group of misfit friends band together—helping each other hold onto their dreams and struggle through the complexities and hardships of everyday life united.  

Topics & Questions for Discussion 

1. Discuss the various forms of prejudice that each character is subjected to throughout the novel. Consider not only the racism that exists in Collier County, but also the less overt discrimination—like the doctors’ attitude toward Robbie-Lee’s mother’s chest pain, or the way Dora is treated for being divorced. Do you think such attitudes are inherent or taught?
 
2. H ow much of a person’s character is shaped by the times in which they live? Was it difficult for you to imagine a time when segregation was so prevalent? When even someone as good-natured as Dora would try not to stare at “the colored girl?” (page 12)
 
3. What was your reaction when Jane reveals to Jackie that she completely fabricates her sex advice columns? Did you find it ironic that she “sounded annoyed” when Jackie asked her if she had actually done what was written in the column? (page 53) How easy do you think is it to ignore the possible consequences of our actions when we are separated from actually having to see the results—by distance, or otherwise?
 
4. Dora says about Jackie, “She was, clearly, a ‘Boston Girl’ through and through. Cultured. Progressive. All that Yankee stuff we Southerners find so irritating.” (page 10) Later Jackie says, “What a mean little redneck town this is. I had no idea it would be so . . . Southern.” (page 205) How did you react to this hidden conflict between North and South? Do you think this sentiment still exists today? What did the rest of the literary society learn from Jackie and her Northern family (and vice versa) that changed these attitudes over the course of the novel?
 
5. Some authors (e.g., Mark Twain) intentionally use colorful storytellers who are to be believed more because of the underlying truth embedded in the story than adherence to rigid standards of objective reporting. Dora, a self-described storyteller, seems to belong in this time-honored category. Do you think she is telling the truth as she knows it? Can a storyteller be an objective narrator? Can anyone truly be an objective narrator?
 
6. What makes Jackie the ideal friend to each member of the Literary Society? What common ground do they share? Do you have someone who has been a similar presence in your life?
 
7. Were there any historical facts about life in Florida during the 1960s that surprised you? In what ways does fiction provide a means for a fuller understanding of a nonfiction truth?
 
8. Why do you think Jackie was the only one who had such a strong response to The Feminine Mystique? Do you think their points still hold true?
 
9. Discuss the members’ reactions to Their Eyes Were Watching God. What did you think of their conversation? Was anyone’s opinion unexpected? Do you think their conversation was worlds apart from the discussion that would take place today when reading the same book?
 
10. Many characters in the book have an alter ego of sorts: Dora is the Turtle Lady, Jackie is Miss Dreamsville, Jane is Jocelyn Winston, and even Miss Lansbury is an Osceola Indian who has been “passing for white.” (page 248) What do these alter egos express about each character’s personality?
 
11. The town is shocked and angry when they discover Jackie is Miss Dreamsville. Do you think their reaction was warranted? What does it say about the disconnect between fantasy and reality? Do you think there was a real person who could’ve satisfied the various visions of Miss Dreamsville? Or would people have been disappointed no matter what?
 
12. Jackie says, “Maybe freedom means defining yourself any way you want to be.” (page 145) Do you agree? How do you feel about Jane’s reaction that “we are a long way from that happening”? Do you think the society members end up defining themselves how they want to be, and thus finding their freedom? Whose life do you think was changed the most by being a part of the society?
 
13. Dora reflects, “How hard it must be to keep fighting for your dream when that dream is probably a mirage.” (page 199) What do you think is the difference between a dream and a mirage? Discuss the role dreams play throughout the novel. Were you surprised to discover Priscilla was pregnant when she seemed to have the most focused dream of going to college and becoming an English teacher?
 
14. After everything that’s happened to them, Dora thinks, “. . . now I could see the genius in allowing the future to evolve. You could create momentum. You could launch something and see where it goes. You couldn’t line everything up, like so many dominoes, and make everything fall into place.” (page 250) Do you agree or disagree with her? What was your reaction to the ending? Did the protagonists follow the paths you thought they would take?
 
15. What differences (or similarities!) did you note between the literary society in the novel and your own book club?

Enhance Your Book Club

  1. Visit Amy Hill Hearth’s website at www.amyhillhearth. com to learn more about the author and to read her essay “Why I Write.”   
 
2. Each character in Miss Dreamsville is searching for a purpose to keep them going or a dream to follow. Bring something to your book club that represents a personal passion and turn the meeting into show-and-tell. you agree with Priscilla that the issues explored in the book weren’t about women universally? What about Robbie’s feeling that men were equally limited in their choices? Do you think their points still hold true?   
 
3. Pick one of the books that the Collier County Literary Society reads, such as Silent Spring, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Their Eyes Were Watching God, The Feminine Mystique, or Little Women to read and discuss at your next book club meeting. How does your discussion compare to the Collier County Women’s Literary Society’s discussion?   
 
4. If you were to have your own radio personality name what would it be? Go around the group and share your imagined on-air pseudonym!

About The Author

Photograph by Colin M. Lenton

Amy Hill Hearth is the author of Miss Dreamsville and the Collier County Women’s Literary Society and Miss Dreamsville and the Lost Heiress of Collier County, in addition to author or coauthor of seven nonfiction books, including Having Our Say: The Delany Sisters’ First 100 Years, the New York Times bestseller-turned-Broadway-play. Hearth, a former writer for The New York Times, began her career as a reporter at a small daily newspaper in Florida, where she met her future husband, Blair (a Collier County native). She is a graduate of the University of Tampa.
 

Product Details

  • Publisher: Atria Books (October 2, 2012)
  • Length: 272 pages
  • ISBN13: 9781451675269

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Raves and Reviews

Amy Hill Hearth's delightful first novel, Miss Dreamville and the Collier County Women's Literary Society is a rollicking, provocative tale about how reading and meeting others who are different can be the most subversive of acts.
—Ruth Pennebaker, author of Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakthrough

"Amy Hill Hearth honors and humanizes people and their wonderful diversities in her debut novel, Miss Dreamsville and the Collier County Women's Literary Society. She astutely weaves pertinent, factual histories into her fictional debut novel. What a laudable book!" –Camille O. Cosby

“Segregation, feminism, gays coming out, interracial dating, it’s all in there, written as it happened in small towns everywhere. And wisdom; you could learn a lot about life from reading this book. Most of all, be daring, be friends, be true to yourself. By the end, I cried and I must say, I wouldn’t mind hearing more about each of the richly painted characters.”
—Patricia Harman author of The Midwife of Hope River, Arms Wide Open: A Midwife’s Journey and The Blue Cotton Gown

Miss Dreamsville‘s cast of characters includes a postmistress, a librarian, a convicted murderer, a northern transplant, a lone African-American girl, and an even lonelier gay man, among others. Set in Naples in the early 1960s, its local color and plot will surprise Florida natives and visitors alike. –Enid Shomer, author of The Twelve Rooms of the Nile

“It’s a fun novel that flies by and makes readers glad Hearth is expanding her own literary horizons.”

– The Hearld Sun

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