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Authors: Cate Campbell

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A READING GROUP GUIDE

HALL OF SECRETS

Cate Campbell

About This Guide

The suggested questions are included
to enhance your group’s reading of
Cate Campbell’s
Hall of Secrets.

Discussion Questions

1.
Fashions for women changed more rapidly in the 1920s than at any earlier time. Do you think the narrower silhouette of women’s clothes was responsible for the increase of eating disorders in the twentieth century, or do you think such disorders already existed? Were you surprised that Margot had difficulty finding research to aid in her diagnosis of Allison’s condition?

2.
Allison Benedict is a young woman coming of age in a time of great social change. What role models did she have as she struggled to be her own person? How was her experience different from that of the English girls she met on
Berengaria
?

3.
Women’s fashions in the 1920s—free of corsets or hobbling long skirts—symbolized new freedoms for women, but they also dictated a certain body style, which was the genesis of the first diet fads. Did the new style create a new form of restriction for women?

4.
Does Edith Benedict’s reaction to her son’s terrible injuries seem the healthy response of a mother’s unconditional love, or is it more evidence of her emotional disturbance?

5.
Hattie, in accepting Allison’s confidences, hints at her personal secrets without revealing them. What do you think holds her back?

6.
Secrets are at the heart of
Hall of Secrets
. Preston uses them as weapons. How do the other characters use them? How does Edith surprise her son and the rest of her family when she learns his secrets?

7.
Margaret Sanger is a controversial figure in history, a woman who championed the rights of women to have control over their lives and their bodies, but who also had strong opinions about whose families should be limited. She met strong opposition not only from the Church but from the American Medical Association. Do you think, on the whole, Mrs. Sanger had a beneficial influence on society?

8.
Is Allison Benedict as much a victim of the rigid social distinctions of the time as Hattie? Do you think, without Margot’s example and encouragement, she would be able to break out of her preordained role?

9.
The period of the 1920s fascinates later generations. We seem to be compelled by the fashions, the music, Prohibition, even the impending Great Depression. Why do you think this period of our history holds such lasting interest?

10.
Are there aspects of society in the 1920s you find appealing? Are there others that offend you?

Photo by Shelly Rae Clift

Cate Campbell is a writer living in the Pacific Northwest. She has worked in more jobs than she can count—as a teacher, an office nurse, a waitress, a nanny, a secretary, a saleswoman, and a singer. The great mansions of Seattle, many built around the turn of the twentieth century, along with her lifelong fascination with medicine, history, Seattle, and the stunning cultural and social changes that marked the decade of the 1920s, are her inspirations for
Benedict Hall
and
Hall of Secrets
. The career of her father, a dedicated physician and a war veteran, served as a model for both Margot Benedict and Frank Parrish. Visit her on the Web at catecampbell.net.

B
ENEDICT
H
ALL

In this richly layered debut novel, Cate Campbell introduces the wealthy Benedict family and takes us behind the grand doors of their mansion, Benedict Hall. There, family and servants alike must face the challenges wrought by World War I—and the dawn of a new age brimming with scandal, intrigue, and social change.

Seattle in 1920 is a city in flux. Horse-drawn carriages share the cobblestone streets with newfangled motorcars. Modern girls bob their hair and show their ankles; cafés defy Prohibition by serving dainty teacups of whisky to returning vets—and the wartime boom is giving way to a depression. Even within the Benedicts’ majestic Queen Anne home, life is changing—above and below stairs.

Margot, the Benedicts’ free-spirited daughter, struggles to succeed as a physician despite gender bias—and personal turmoil. The household staff, especially longtime butler Abraham Blake, has always tried to protect Margot from her brother Preston’s cruel streak. Yet war has altered Preston, too—not for the better. And when a chance encounter brings a fellow army officer into the Benedict fold, Preston’s ruthlessness is triggered to new heights.

An engineer at the fledgling Boeing Company, Frank Parrish has been wounded body and soul, and in Margot, he senses a kindred spirit. But their burgeoning friendship and Preston’s growing wickedness will have explosive repercussions for everyone at Benedict Hall—rich and poor, black and white—as Margot dares to follow her own path, no matter the consequences.

KENSINGTON BOOKS are published by

Kensington Publishing Corp.
119 West 40th Street
New York, NY 10018

Kensington and the K logo Reg. U.S. Pat. & TM Off.

ISBN: 978-0-7582-9228-5

ISBN-10: 0-7582-9228-7

eISBN-13: 978-0-7582-9229-2
eISBN-10: 0-7582-9229-5
First Kensington Electronic Edition: February 2014