Last Ride to Graceland (30 page)

INTRODUCTION

W
hen Cory Beth Ainsworth discovers a 1973 Stutz Blackhawk in her parents' shed, all of her suspicions are confirmed. She was not a nine-pound nine-ounce preemie. She was a product of her mother Honey's single wild year in Graceland, and it's time that she learned the truth about her real father, Elvis Presley.

But truth is a tricky thing, as Cory soon learns. Retracing Honey's journey from Memphis to South Carolina, she stops in Georgia, Alabama, and Mississippi, finding that the road is taking her further from her destiny at every turn. Her desperate search for a father yields instead a complex portrait of her mother, whose beautiful voice and rebellious spirit inspired the King even as his own song was fading.

In this latest novel, Kim Wright stuns with a wrenching portrayal of a mother and daughter whose powerful love for music binds them in a way they never could have expected.

TOPICS AND QUESTIONS FOR DISCUSSION

1.
 The epigraph quotes Bruce Springsteen on Elvis,
“It was like he came along and whispered some dream in everybody's ear, and somehow we all dreamed it.”
What do you think Springsteen meant by this, and how does it resonate throughout the novel?

2.
 Cory Beth begins her story with an introduction to the South, where half-truths necessarily infiltrate a culture built on propriety and kindness. But when do half-truths become more harmful than helpful? Name a few moments in the text when they morph into full-blown lies, and discuss the consequences of that.

3.
 Memory plays a powerful part in this story. Cory is overwhelmed by her sensory reaction to the 1973 Stutz Blackhawk, calling it a time capsule. When else do memories arise unexpectedly from a sound or a smell, and how does that influence her decisions?

4.
 Before she sets off on her quest, Leary tells Cory,
“That road out there can't tell you a single thing that you don't already know.”
Do you think he ends up being right? Why or why not?

5.
 In our first glimpse of Honey, we learn that she desperately wants to avoid the life her mother prescribed for her. How does this generational divide trickle down to Cory? How much can we really resist our inheritances?

6.
 As she drives through the imposing gates of Graceland, Honey experiences a sense of foreboding and wonders whether the place is as much a prison as it is a dream. What does she mean here? Can the two be one and the same?

7.
 Philip tells Honey that his life
“was written for me before I was born. I'm just turning the pages and living it, year by year.”
Discuss how destiny can inhibit certain freedoms.

8.
 Honey initially records her thoughts in brief diary passages, eventually winnowing them down to haikus. Why does she find it easier to
“edit reality,”
reducing and simplifying her experiences into something more digestible?

9.
 Cory has a hard time reconciling the contradictory accounts of her mother from Fantasy Phil and Marilee. Are they both correct? How can our personality be fractured, based on how we present ourselves differently to different kinds of people? Does Cory do the same? How so?

10.
 Marilee, wistfully taking stock of the run-down Doozy's Barbecue, claims that
“things that get that wet are never quite dry again.”
Is she just talking about the restaurant? What else could she mean here?

11.
 Discuss the significance of place of origin as it pertains to the novel. David Beth, for instance, is from both nowhere and everywhere. He claims that
“people are whatever they choose to be.”
How does this mantra bleed into his life's work? What do we lose when we lose our home?

12.
 Why do you think Cory is finally able to perform Elvis's “Love Me Tender” in Fairhope? What parallels do you see between her life and his?

13.
 Elvis suffers the loss of his unborn twin acutely. Honey tells Cory that we all have a kind of twin out there in the world who cannot live if we survive. What does this particular brand of “symmetry” say about the larger message of the novel?

14.
 Why does Honey throw the blue hound dog toy into the water?

15.
 Discuss the last scene with Cory and Bradley. What has he become to her, and how has forgiveness played a part in this new relationship? Where do you think Cory will go from here?

ENHANCE YOUR BOOK CLUB

1.
 Write your own haikus that express your daily joys and anxieties. Share them with one another and discuss what it was like to condense your personal experiences down to syllables.

2.
 Marilee says
“there are lots of ways to sing.”
She, for example, enjoys expressing herself through cooking. How do you “sing”? Tell one another a little bit more about your passions and how they inform your everyday life.

3.
 Give “The King” his proper due! Make your own peanut butter and bacon sandwiches and host an Elvis listening party, or have a movie night to watch films like
Jailhouse Rock
and
Blue Hawaii
. And feel free to try out your best impressions.

AUTHOR PHOTOGRAPH BY ALAN JENKINS

KIM WRIGHT is an acclaimed novelist who is a two-time winner of the Lowell Thomas Award for travel writing, and she has been writing about travel, food, and wine for more than thirty years. Kim lives in Charlotte, North Carolina.

ALSO BY KIM WRIGHT

The Canterbury Sisters

The Unexpected Waltz

Love in Mid Air

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Gallery Books

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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author's imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Copyright © 2016 by Kim Wright

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form whatsoever. For information, address Gallery Books Subsidiary Rights Department, 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10020.

First Gallery Books trade paperback edition May 2016

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Cover design by Regina Starace

Cover photograph © Eva Worobiec/Arcangel

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Wright, Kim

Last ride to Graceland / Kim Wright.

First Gallery Books trade paperback edition. | New York : Gallery Books, 2016.

Mothers and daughters—Fiction. | Voyages and travels—Fiction. | Family secrets—Fiction. | BISAC: FICTION / Contemporary Women. | Family Life. | Literary. | Road fiction.

LCC PS3623.R5545 L37 2016 | DDC 813/.6—dc23

ISBN 978-1-5011-0078-9

ISBN 978-1-5011-0081-9 (ebook)