60 pages • 2 hours read
Ann PatchettA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Dr. Marina Singh, the novel’s protagonist, is an intensely loyal, empathetic, and talented researcher and pharmacologist in her early 40s, struggling to extricate herself from troubling romantic patterns and a traumatic past. Her past traumas have multiple origins, starting with her father, a medical student from India, who abandoned her and her white American mother to return his home country after completing his schooling at the University of Minnesota. This separation left Marina to grow up without a father, and resulted in recurring, traumatic nightmares that force her to relive this abandonment again and again. Connected to her father’s abandonment is Marina’s troubling pattern of romantic relationships, including a failed marriage in her 20s, and her current relationship with a 61-year-old-man who is nearly old enough to be her father. Her love interest, Mr. Fox, is not only 20 years older but is also her boss, the CEO of Vogel. Although she hopes to achieve a loving relationship with Mr. Fox, these hopes are extremely naïve, since he refuses to acknowledge their relationship publicly, refuses to verbally express his love for her, and constantly prioritizes company profits over their relationship.
Marina’s troubled relationships with her father and men in general are not the only challenges related to her past.
By Ann Patchett
Bel Canto
Ann Patchett
Commonwealth
Ann Patchett
Run
Ann Patchett
The Dutch House
Ann Patchett
The Magician's Assistant
Ann Patchett
The Patron Saint of Liars
Ann Patchett
These Precious Days: Essays
Ann Patchett
Tom Lake
Ann Patchett
Truth and Beauty
Ann Patchett