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This is the thread to discuss the next part of this massive and emotionally devastating novel.

1. As some of you may have already noticed, this is not a standard narrative. Yes, there are some elements of storytelling, but mostly this is a character-driven book.Do you think it is the right approach for this type of the novel. So far, do you think the novel benefits from this approach or actually it loses its narrative edge and nothing can substitute a good story?

2. What do you think about the flashbacks and insights into Jude's life? How do they help us to understand his ulterior motives?

3. Do you understand the decision to adopt Jude? Do we as readers allow Jude to be happy or do we want to keep him as a perpetual victim and a perennial sufferer?

4. What was your emotional reaction to Jude's suffering in the orphanage?

I am looking forward to your replies. Thank you!!!!!

Zulfiya wrote: "2. What do you think about the flashbacks and insights into Jude's life? How do they help us to understand his ulterior motives?"

I liked the flashbacks and insights into Jude's life as they slowly led me to a greater understanding of him as a character/person. I think knowing it all at once would have been overpowering. I not sure what you mean by Jude's "ulterior motives," which is a term that I often associate with negative connotations. The flashbacks and insignts help me understand Jude and why he avoids or turns aside inquiries into his past/family.

I'd say at this point, the character driven narrative worked very well for me. There was so much to learn about the characters themselves that I didn't feel a strong urge for more to happen. The pieces that did develop in this section, such as Jude's relationship with Harold, I found compelling. I was incredibly happy (and somewhat relieved) when Harold and his wife decide to adopt him.

It was difficult to read about Jude's past. In some ways, it was hard not learning more about Jude's past right away, though I think there would have been something unnatural about us all learning everything from the get go.

In another group read I did for this book, other readers commented on the gender roles in the book. Many felt as though the characters either sounded more like female characters or were written in a way where they could have passed for both male or female. Did any of you get this sense by this stage in the book? Does it seem to matter that our main characters are male?

Caroline wrote: "Does it seem to matter that our main characters are male?..."

Hmmm. And our author is female. And people are concurrently arguing whether the author Elena Ferrante is male or female. Back to the old nubs about which gender can accurately portray which gender? Or on to a deeper level of understanding that question?

Linda wrote: "Zulfiya wrote: "2. What do you think about the flashbacks and insights into Jude's life? How do they help us to understand his ulterior motives?"

I liked the flashbacks and insights into Jude's li..."

I also like the flashback, and I like that they are sparingly used in the novel, and some of them are quite climactic.

Caroline wrote: "I'd say at this point, the character driven narrative worked very well for me. There was so much to learn about the characters themselves that I didn't feel a strong urge for more to happen. The pi..."

I hear you, Caroline. This is how I felt in this part, and even in subsequent parts. It was too painful to read, and too grotesque, and too unbelievable, but yet, quite realistic.

Lily wrote: "Hmmm. And our author is female. And people are concurrently arguing whether the author Elena Ferrante ..."

The question of gender here in the novel is quite an intriguing one. There are very few female characters, and they are mostly cameo characters, or even I would call them space fillers or world fillers because it is obviously not a high fantasy novel where the lands are populated only by male species. :-) I am quite intrigued why the author decided to focus on male characters only, and for that purpose quite convincingly.

Zulfiya wrote: "The question of gender here in the novel is quite an intrigui..."

The Roommates: True Tales of Friendship, Rivalry, Romance, and Disturbingly Close Quarters

Yanagihara is shown by Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ as editor of the above book by Stephanie Wu, which was apparently very much about female friendships. I wonder if Little Life is partly a response to that. Also, it is considered a real test of writerly skills to be able to "write" the "opposite" sex, so LL may reflect that challenge. Third, although I haven't read it, the reviews of her first novel, The People in the Trees , suggest it was heavily male oriented in its character set.

But your question is such an appropriate one given our text, Zulfiya, that certainly some interviewer must have placed it to Yanagihara. I haven't really gone looking for interviews and professional reviews yet.

Lily wrote: "Zulfiya wrote: "The question of gender here in the novel is quite an intrigui..."

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Here is an interview that addresses the question of why men as the primary characters -- .

I listened yesterday through what is Chapter 4 in the audio version. I suspect that may be into Part II based on the discussion here. (My hard copy should be here this afternoon; for some unknown reason, for this book I feel as if I want some immediate, physical sensation of where I am in the read, rather than a percentage in the lower right corner.) I must say that chapter 4 in the audio is a sprawling, albeit powerful, piece of storytelling. I'll have to re-visit to understand the time span and how the leaps, and hence gaps, are soldered together to seem continuous to the listener. Also, the writing shifted so drastically, almost into an essay on law and governance, at the end. (My mind wanted to know Yanagihara's sources for that piece.)

This piece had part of the wrenching backstory of Jude (will we eventually get more?). One strong female character did have a short cameo presence -- Ana? (I'll have to check the text.) But I was also fascinated by the number of characters that were introduced in this rather short section -- if every word needs be in this novel (shouldn't have been edited out?), why are each of these here? Certainly the multitude of boarders in the house in Boston added a sense of the world into which young professionals with elite educations in our major U.S. cities live today -- and a sense of how they interact socially while pursuing their parallel daily responsibilities.

Can someone explain the law in the case Harold mentions where the plaintiffs are successful in their case against the woman who loaned her van for the transport of the team and all the passengers were killed in an accident?

Does anyone have any hypotheses about why Jude calls that result "right"? What does/might he mean by "right" (versus "fair")? Would Jude have said the legal result was also "fair"?

This ... book calls so for a wish to discuss with someone as one reads it, at least for me.

Lily wrote: "Can someone explain the law in the case Harold mentions where the plaintiffs are successful in their case against the woman who loaned her van for the transport of the team and all the passengers w..."

It's been a while since I read over that part in the book but I believe this should cover the gist of it. Jude's hypothesis about "right" vs "fair" is similar to what many first year law students struggle with when they first start learning the law - and tort law in particular. Much of how the tort system works is not necessarily in line with what we think of as a fair or just outcome, but it's how things operate in the US.

I don't remember all the details of the case, but I'm pretty sure it's something we studied in my Business Associations class to cover the topic of agency (exciting stuff, I know!). To the best of my memory, a school sports team needed some cars to drive to a game so they asked the woman (I think a parent) if she would drive some of the kids. I believe she told them she couldn't go but said they should take her car. Later, the coach driving the car got into an accident and injured several people. According to A Little Life, the woman who loaned her vehicle was held liable for damages caused by the accident. To anyone looking on the outside, it doesn't seem fair that the woman would be liable for the death and damage caused. She wasn't driving the van and wouldn't it seem reasonable to trust a school employee and coach to drive safely? Why isn't the driver solely responsible for the harm caused?

It's been a while, but I think the court ruled that the coach was essentially an agent for the woman because she had given the coach permission to use her car to transport the team, subject to the condition that he drove. Under agency law, it's "right" to hold the person directing the actions of the agent ("principal") liable for actions of the agent, at least while that agent is acting within the scope of the work he or she is supposed to perform for the principal. So, even though the woman had no direct role in the accident, she was liable for the coach's conduct because the coach was acting within the scope of what they had agreed to. I think that's enough legal talk from me for now!

Caroline wrote: "Lily wrote: "Can someone explain the law in the case Harold mentions where the plaintiffs are successful in their case against the woman who loaned her van for the transport of the team and all the..."

Basically that's it. The woman's insurance company would likely pay up to its limit if the auto was being driven with her permission. If she had personal liability insurance on top of car insurance, it would also kick in. Legally, the right result but fair, maybe not. The school could also have had liability, as the coach driving was a school employee engaged in a school sanctioned event. Tort law is rarely fair -- hence the captured burgaler who sues the homeowner for breaking his leg when the basement stairs collapse during the burgalry

@12 & @13 --

Linda and Caroline -- thank you both! Fits with other pieces of law I know, but I couldn't have constructed what you clarify here.

Still, given Harold's comments about "fair" and "right" and their linkage to upbringing, I am still a tiny bit uncertain Jude meant the same thing about "right" as you state it so correctly. Did Jude perhaps mean "right" would have included for the monks to have been accountable for his treatment? Not sure of the logic here -- which Jude is attributed to consider as well as the law.

Completed Part II, and I have been reeling from the painful revelations about Jude's background. If any writing technique could allow the reader to tolerate this, it is the flashbacks asked about and already discussed.

What was even more painful for me were the scenes when we realize how much his tortured past has affected Jude's self esteem. The degree to which he does not see himself worthy of even the most basic human caring just wrenched my heart. And to think about the number of individuals in his past whom he had to or felt he could trust, but then these very individuals are the ones who so horrifically betrayed him through their cruelty and torture. The pain this evoked in me was visceral.

I still am not sure what to make of Harold and Juliet's adoption of Jude. Even with the middle chapter in this section written from Harold's point of view, I have trouble with their credibility. I pray they remain kind and sheltering to Jude because he more than deserves this kindness, but I fear for Jude some level of betrayal by them in his future. I find my emotions to be the result of the artful writing by Yanagihara. Jude is real and a part of my life, part of the live people I care most about at this point in time, even though I haven't come close to living the horrors he's endured.

Maureen wrote: "...Jude is real and a part of my life, part of the live people I care most about at this point in time, even though I haven't come close to living the horrors he's endured...."

Maureen -- since factually, Jude is a character created by Yanagihara, can you tell us why he seems so live, perhaps in contrast to someone we read about in a newspaper article with comparably horrid life experiences?

While I "feel" the pain the author has created around Jude, I also have a sense of being an observer to this story. I don't know if it is the writing itself, this particular story and its details, my personality, or the amount of reading of stories I have done over a lifetime that give me this ability to create a sense of distance from any "reality." For example, I think my reaction is quite less visceral than it was for Wave by Sonali Deraniyagala as she tells the story of the loss of her family in the Christmas tsunami and her subsequent return to a willingness to resume her life fully. (Yet I know others who consider hers sort of just an unfortunate rich woman's story.)

Nonetheless, I do find I have to take breaks from reading LL and read other things. I also think this story will give me a different kind of awareness of other stories of horrific abuse. A little bit like sitting in a community meeting in a town in Vermont many years ago and listening to a doctor rise to tell of an infant with still pliable bones brought to ER for care and having some twenty plus fractures. Never have thought quite the same about the possibility of such treatment of a child in someone's care that "should" have been loving.

Maureen wrote: "I still am not sure what to make of Harold and Juliet's adoption of Jude. Even with the middle chapter in this section written from Harold's point of view, I have trouble with their credibility. I pray they remain kind and sheltering to Jude because he more than deserves this kindness, but I fear for Jude some level of betrayal by them in his future. I"

All the time I was reading the novel, I was expecting and hoping NOT to deal with betrayal among the people who actually love him.

I also experienced similar feelings reading about Jude's past. Sometimes it was impossible to read about his sufferings, but it was equally impossible to put the book down.

Lily wrote: "Maureen wrote: "...Jude is real and a part of my life, part of the live people I care most about at this point in time, even though I haven't come close to living the horrors he's endured...."

Lily, you asked me why I see Jude as a real person rather than a character. I have pondered this a bit, and my reasons are two-fold. First, part of a writer's achievement is to elicit a reader's response, a reader's empathy with the character. Usually this is achieved by an appeal to very common human feelings and perhaps experiences. Jude's character touches on that part of all of us who do not feel worthy or deserving of someone's kindness.

This dovetails into my second reason: I most often read with an analytical distance as you seem to describe. However I find myself at a point in my life where my younger self who read with total immersion and identification with characters has been united with my adult self who usually sets myself apart when I am immersed in reading a novel, watching a film, observing a work of art, or listening to a finely composed piece of music. I have more fully embraced both responses to reading. Maybe this is because I am hitting an age when I have had so many diverse and unexpected experiences, both positive and negative, that I engage myself more fully in creative endeavors.

And I agree with Zulifya @17 that at times, unlike the character, I can put the book down and distract myself for awhile.

Maureen, Zulfiya -- thank you both for your insightful and thoughtful posts.

At the moment, I have put LL quite aside for several days to read some "required" material for a couple of other groups. Perhaps my very reading pattern for LL has contributed to my particular "keeping a distance." I love Maureen's description of the ability to move between modes.

I think the way Yanagihara portrays Jude, showing us only glimpses of his past here and there, and for the time being omitting a lot, was a way to make the reader digest all the information about him and actually really care for the character all the time. If she described it all at once, it would be easy to inure yourself to his suffering, saying that his story was just too implausible. At least in my case she succeeded brilliantly, even though I admit that I had to stop several times and read the novel slowly. Yet I still keep thinking about Jude, even after having finished the book.

Somehow, I never doubted the sincerity of Harold's feelings when reading this part. I simply felt happy for Jude that he was finally able to have a family.

This chapter was titled "The Postman". I think it illustrates very well the whole section: JB with his characteristic lack of tact described Jude as the 'Post-Man', a person who is not a man anymore but somebody beyond all that: “We never see him with anyone, we don’t know what race he is, we don’t know anything about him � [He’s] post-sexual, post-racial, post-identity, post-past.�.

Lily and Zulfiya's - thank you for your responses and thoughts.

Teanka @20 - your first paragraph about the author's method in revealing Jude's character is spot on. Thanks for this perspective. And I also think of him when I am not reading. I also appreciate your interpretation of the chapter's title, " The Postman." I have not been taking the time to analyze the names of each section as well as the chapters. At this point, I think that will have to come when I complete the book.