Welcome back to the fourth day of our book club readalong for OwlCrate's March book, A Forgery of Roses!
Just a reminder that this will be a SPOILER discussion for Chapters 20-25 of A Forgery of Roses, so make sure you read are finished this section before continuing.
Discussion questions are listed below, and anyone who participates in the comments will be entered to win a free OwlCrate box! Don't forget, you can also post about the readalong on Instagram with the hashtag #OCAForgeryOfRoses for another chance to win!
The story continues...
Chapter 20:
Left alone in the dining room with Governor Harris, he asks Myra for a word and leads her to his office. He tells her of his son’s illness and how important it is for her to stay to the dedicated areas of the house. Martel needs a word, and as the Governor slips into the hall Myra runs around the desk to look for any type of clue. She finds a note that says “the papers, as promised” with the same signature as the wax seal that fell from Will’s pocket. She gets back to her chair in time for the Governor to return and dismiss her.
On the way back to her room she runs into August having a panic attack in the hallway as he was unprepared for Felicity’s father to be with her. Myra helps him breathe through it and promises they can talk later.
In her room she retrieves the wax seal and finds the note she took from Mrs. Harris’ coat the previous night. It contains a list of Prodigies, all people who previously owned studios but have now disappeared and Myra recognizes the handwriting as that of the same person who had been sketching Prodigies in the notebook. Exhausted, and not seeing any way of getting more information during the day, Myra falls asleep.
Chapter 21:
Myra is woken by August knocking at her door - she slept through lunch. He proposes they eat outside, despite the cold. They meet in the maze and he reveals that he didn’t find much in the servants’ quarters except a note under Ameline’s pillow reading “Tomorrow night. Midnight. Make sure you aren’t followed” signed with the same V as the wax seal and the note from Mrs. Harris’ pocket. August recognizes it as the signature of a forger his friend Thompson had previously found, and they decide to go into town and get Thompson help to find them.
Chapter 22:
Thompson directs them to the forger, Vincent, and in the cab on the way there Myra tells August all about Lucy, how brilliant she is and about her illness. He promises to ask his father to pay for a doctor if Myra can’t bring Will back.
An old man directs them to Vincent, who accepts August’s pocket watch as payment to answer one question. He tells them that he forged medical documents for Will on behalf of the Governor, but refuses to reveal more. He seems to know that Myra isn’t Maeve at all.
Chapter 23:
Either Will’s father was able to get the forger to create the documents in a matter of hours after Will’s death, or he had them made in advance, certainly seeming to implicate him if Will was murdered. They have a heart to heart, but in the end Will asks Myra not to tell anyone their suspicions about his father, and to paint him, to alter him to look like Will, if she cannot bring Will back to life. Myra agrees, but doesn’t like it.
Chapter 24:
Nearly out of ladyrose gel, Myra decides she needs to go to Elsie’s studio to get more and in a dangerous move jumps on the back of the Governor’s cab, remaining undetected. When she gets to the studio though Elsie doesn’t reply when called and Myra finds her stabbed, dying in a puddle of her own blood. Before she passes she tells Myra to go. That they are looking for her. They said they killed Harris. Myra flees back into the cold.
Chapter 25:
Myra makes the trek in the snowstorm back to Rose Manor, freezing, but once there August tells her that her father discovered what she had been doing, and Mrs. Harris claimed Myra must have been doing it behind her back. August refuses to tell his father the truth and she is kicked out of the manor, left alone freezing in the snow.
Questions:
- Do you think Will's father is behind the murder? If not, why do you think he obtained forged medical documents?
- August claims Nigel and Will were close, but he seems to be against Myra. Do you think he is involved, or is he prejudiced against Prodigies? Both?
- Why do you think Vincent sent Ameline a note asking her to meet at midnight?
- Where do you think Myra will go now that she's been discovered and kicked out of Rose Manor?
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