Introduction

Lush and fiercely beautiful, Moon Tide follows the lives of three women in a small fishing town on the Massachusetts coast, from 1913 to the Great New England Hurricane of 1938.

In evocative prose, Moon Tide traces the ebbs and flows of the human heart -- the violence of memory and the redemptive power of longing -- matched against the unpredictable tempers of the natural world.

Eve takes refuge in silence and art after witnessing the death of her mother. She can sense how the dead nip at the heels of the living, and her ethereal beauty inspires a quiet passion in Jake, the son of a local stonemason. Eve's wealthy, eccentric grandmother, Elizabeth, stays on in the town year round, amassing a great library for the cold New England winters. And then there is Maggie, the exotic stranger, with long bones, dark hands, and a peculiar clairvoyance. Maggie lives in the precarious space between the locals and the rich—a balance that is ultimately compromised by Wes, a ruthless rum-smuggler, whose desire for her triggers small cruelties and then a staggering act of violence. With lyrical prose, wisdom, and insight, Dawn Clifton Tripp maps the shifting tensions in a small town on the verge of change. Like the growing weight of a storm, the lives in Westport Point build in emotional momentum even as the Great Hur-ricane approaches, and the landscape of the earth comes to reflect the geography of the mind. A novel of love and loss, survival and revelation, Moon Tide is an extraordinary debut.

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Excerpt

PART I

ELIZABETH

CHAPTER 1

Westport Point

Early June. They wash in over the bridge and down to their huge cottages on East Beach and behind the Horseneck dunes. The Hotel Westport sheds its window boards and the music off the phonograph circles the wraparound porch. It sticks in the slats between the shingle wood, notes of new and unfamiliar jazz spilling down the front steps with women in sandal heels and long city dresses that slowly rise with the years toward the knee. ... view entire excerpt...

Discussion Questions

Publisher's Reading Guide Questions:

1. In many ways, Moon Tide explores issues of class in American society
through the microcosm of the small, New England fishing town of Westport, Massachusetts. Discuss how class creates both real and apparent boundaries
between the characters. How do these issues affect the people who live in
Westport year-round and those who only come for summer?

2. Discuss the differences between the three women in the novel and how
these differences affect not only their individual lives but also their
interactions. How does where they come from originally influence how they
perceive themselves and how they are perceived by one another. Explore the
ways in which age, money, class, marriage, and children work to define not
only who they are but also how their lives are different from one another.

3. The story is told from the perspective of several characters. Why do you
think the author chose to do this? In what ways did it allow the reader more
access to the interior lives of the characters than a more traditional
narrative?

4. Tripp dedicates much of the effort of her lyrical prose to portraying the
landscape of the region, and she is a current resident of the town in which
the novel takes place. Like Tripp, the inhabitants of Westport are deeply
connected to the sea and the landscape of their town, so much so that nature
is almost a character in the novel. How does nature, and particularly the
hurricane, influence the lives of the characters? Why do you think the
natural world is such a force in this novel? Explore the ways in which the different
characters relate to nature.

5. Maggie is somewhat of the town outsider, especially when compared to Eve
and Elizabeth, but in many ways she is more connected to the locals of the
town. Why do you think this is? She is also very connected to nature, which
gives her a special place in this book. Explore the ways in which Maggie’s
deep connection to the land allows her to be more connected to the life of
Westport and to be privy to knowledge that other characters are not?


8. Eve has been a part of the Westport community from a very early age. However, of the three women, she is the one that seems to be able to not be consumed and defined by the town. Discuss Eve’s relationship to the town, especially compared to the other characters. Eve’s trip to Paris is one of the only times that the author leaves the Westport community behind. Why do you think Tripp may have chosen to do this? What does it reveal about Eve that might not have been explored otherwise? Eve’s complexity as a character is revealed to the reader early on in the novel when she secretly paints with food in her room. What did you conclude about her from this episode? How might this act have helped her to connect with her mother who had died? What qualities did it reveal about her as a child, and how does it inform your understanding of her later as an adult?

9. Discuss the role of love in the novel, particularly the role it plays in
the three women’s lives. Compare the relationship between Wes and Maggie
with that of Jake’s desire for Eve. How does love relate to the other themes
in the novel like longing, absence, and memory?

Weblinks

»	Publisher's Book Info
»	Chapter Excerpt Excerpted from Moon Tide by Dawn Clifton Tripp Copyright© 2003 by Dawn Clifton Tripp. Excerpted by permission of Random House, a division of Random House, Inc.
»	Author Q&A about the origins and inspirations of the book

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