Girls of Tender Age A Memoir

Girls of Tender AgeReading Group GuideWritten with great humor and tenderness,Girls of Tender Agecombines an intimate family memoir with the tale of a community plagued by a horrifying crime. Mary-Ann Tirone Smith's Hartford neighborhood is small-town America, where everyone's door is unlocked and everything is within walking distance. Her loving family is peopled with memorable characters, but Smith's household was also "different" because her older brother, Tyler, was autistic before anyone knew what that meant. Unable to bear noise of any kind, Tyler was Mary-Ann's real-life Boo Radley.Hanging over Smith's family is the sinister shadow of an approaching serial killer. The menacing Bob Malm lurks throughout this joyous and chaotic family portrait, and the havoc he unleashes when the paths of innocence and evil cross one early December evening in 1953 forever alters the landscape of Smith's childhood.Reading group discussion questions1. Mary-Ann's father's role as primary caretaker is established early in her life. On page 10 she tells the story of waking up too late to see her father before he goes to work. She cries, knowing that missing him "means a day without any attention whatsoever." What is her mother's reaction to Mary-Ann's tears? How do the parents' actions throughout the book reinforce your early impressions of them? Does either of them ever change? Does the way that Mary-Ann relates to them ever change?2. The young Mary-Ann is "always looking for ways to be transported out of the bedlam that is my home" (55), yet as an adult she is saddened when the crying of her new baby means she must be "banished" from her parents' house. Discuss her conflicting needs to be both close and distant from her family at various points in her life.3. Consider Mary-Ann's experiences with death prior to Irene's murder. What does she learn from each? What is the cumulative effect of the experiences -- do they prepare her in any way to cope with the murder? How do they leave her unprepared?4. Mary-Ann says that as a child, her "fear is related to the irrational -- terror of the guillotine lopping off my feet, for example." (page 140) What are some of her other irrational childhood fears and what causes them? Do you see a pattern in the causes?5. Language -- written and spoken -- plays an important part in the book. The lack of it harms Mary-Ann: "to this day, I sometimes mispronounce words because of the dearth of speech in my house." (page 58) But the written word provides her with escape, and the book itself brings her closure. What are some other examples of the significance of language in her life? What are some instances when words left unsaid are as powerful as those that are spoken?6. ThoughGirls of Tender Ageprimarily focuses on the personal lives of the author and her family, it also reveals a great deal about small town communities and American culture in the 1950s. What is the town of Hartford like? What makes it distinctive from, or representative of, the rest of America? Discuss references the author makes to common 1950s attitudes or beliefs.7. When Mary-Ann's professor tells her that her brother is not retarded, but autistic -- an "idiot savant", she is surprised. Why do you think an alternate description of her brother never occurred to her? The professor describes life with Tyler as a "rigid, narrow grid" (page 158). Do you agree with this description? How does the nature of the "grid" change when Mary-Ann's mother goes back to work? When Tyler grows older?8. In many ways, police procedures are more advanced today then they were in the 1950s...and in may ways they are not. How might Robert Malm's crimes have been handled differently today? Consider the police's actions after Malm's assault of Pidgie D'Allessio, the investigation of the crime scene after Irene's murder, and Pidgie's identification of Malm. How might the questioning of Fred Fiederowicz beSmith, Mary-Ann Tirone is the author of 'Girls of Tender Age A Memoir', published 2005 under ISBN 9780743279772 and ISBN 0743279778.