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Mistik Lake by Martha Brooks

Summary

Two generations worth of secrets come to a head when Odella, the third generation, loses her mother and has to turn to her great aunt as a confidant. During the course of a year, Odella falls in love and grows up fast as she tries to hold her family together. Her mother, the lone survivor of a tragic accident, has finally left her family and moved to Iceland where she dies in a climbing accident. Odella’s first real love, is a boy from the small town where the accident happened and where a secret has been so closely guarded that only two people are left to reveal it. And Odella’s aunt, Gloria, who has secrets of her own orchestrates the final climax. Told in different voices and with a ghostlike quality, this tender story will take readers to a truly small town with compelling characters and leave them with new found appreciation for family history and the power of love to overcome the secrets and the tragedy

Booktalk

When your mother’s life is marked by tragedy, and family secrets run deep, it is hard to be 17 and to hold it all together. Luckily, Odella, has a good heart and strong convictions. She has survived a harsh Winter, a Spring unlike any other marked by death and love, and is now immersed in the intensity of Summer in a very small town in Winnipeg. The town holds secrets that will swirl around Odella as she makes hard choices and finds herself drawn to certain characters for reasons that are all too ready to reveal themselves. Love, loss, longstanding tragedy and forgiveness are all themes that have touched us at some point in our lives. For Odella, they all came at once.

207 pages, 9th grade and up

Discussion questions

Warning! Some of the questions contain key elements of the plot. Do not read if you don't want to know what happens!

  1. What is special about Odella’s relationship with her mother and father?
  2. Do you think that Sally (Odella’s mom) was ever happy?
  3. How does Odella’s relationship with her sisters change through out the story?
  4. Which secret is the hardest for Odella to understand?
  5. Why did so many people hide so much?
  6. Who is the most important person in Odella’s life (as a child, as a young adult)?
  7. What is important about the obituary for Sally?
  8. Does Odella make good choices throughout the book?

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