69 pages 2 hours read

Rebecca Makkai

I Have Some Questions for You

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2023

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Themes

The Role of Memory in the Search for Truth

Content Warning: This section of the guide features depictions of suicide, self-harm, disordered eating, and sexual assault.

The search for truth in I Have Some Questions for You organizes much of the novel’s narration, as the title suggests. Bodie, the narrator, has questions for everyone, from the students she knew at Granby to the deceased abusers in Hollywood whose wrongdoings she examines on Starlet Fever. Accordingly, her narration and her internal musings throughout the novel take the form of questions, accusations, and explanations aimed at the imaginary presence of her Granby music teacher, Mr. Dennis Bloch. Evocative of a podcast, the questions will never be answered by Bloch; instead, Bodie takes an active role in seeking those answers for herself, accessing her memories and ferreting out evidence from the trial as she attempts to solve the murder of Thalia Keith.

Early in the novel, Bodie connects her search for truth and what really happened after their performance of Camelot to her professional podcast. Imagining what motivated Omar to kill Thalia, Bodie says, “I turned it over, lap after lap, the cold water settling deep in my joints. The story I knew felt a lot like the stories Lance and I examined on our podcast, the ones passed down through decades of misinformation and bias” (81).

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By Rebecca Makkai

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