63 pages • 2 hours read
Jodi PicoultA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Ruth Jefferson’s voice is the first we hear. She is a person who has always tried to fit in and play by the rules to get ahead, trying to correct the imbalance imposed on her by an unequal and biased society. She has always had to be incredibly careful with her words and actions, trying to put others ahead of herself in order not to offend. As we see through the actions of her coworkers and the trajectory of her trial, however, she is not able to escape the stereotypes she has tried so hard to avoid. Many still see her as dangerous and as angry.
Ruth’s sister, Rachel changes her name to Adisa, an African name, and represents a facet of black life that is different from Ruth’s. Rather than trying to fit in and play by white-majority rules, Adisa sees the game as rigged and decides not to try to play at all. She prides herself on being who she is and openly criticizes societal rules that prioritize white comfort over equality or equity. She’s good at getting things done and helps Ruth get on assistance after society has failed her. Because of these differences, she and Ruth butt heads often, though they maintain their love for one another. She is also a vehicle for the novel’s brief discussion of colorism, since Ruth has light skin and Adisa has dark skin.
Ruth’s son, Edison, is an interesting middle ground between Ruth and Adisa. He can meld with society’s expectations of him in ways that are similar to Ruth—ways that Ruth has helped to instill in him. He also finds, in a similar way, that he is not able to truly fit in within white society, but also does not fit in with the more explicitly black-identified society of his cousins at Adisa’s house. However, once he begins seeing the fractures in his white friendships, he begins hanging out and blending in more with Adisa’s children, and is eventually able to code-switch fairly well, bouncing from one group to another and adapting to each in turn. Edison is smart and responsible, but also a teenager who can blow up at his mother and make mistakes.
Louanne Brooks, Ruth and Adisa’s mother, has worked as a “domestic” for her entire life. Although the Hallowells claim her as one of the family, Ruth and Adisa are uncomfortably aware of the gulf between their family and the Hallowells. Lou is a person who tries to instill in her daughter to be grateful for what is given them in an unequal society, while trying to remain aware of those inequalities. She has a balancing effect on Ruth.
Turk represents the new guard of white supremacy. Having gotten more savvy and recognizing the ways in which overt racism is no longer being tolerated in society, but the ways in which implicit racism is still largely apparent, Turk is able to help his father-in-law adapt the movement, making it less overt and more media-savvy. Turk provides a model for how someone can become radicalized into an extremist group, converting the real hurt and pain of his brother’s death into a hatred of an entire group, because a black man was involved in the accident that took Turk’s brother’s life. In this manner, we also see him as a model for how a person can overcome hatred and convert it into something more positive. Turk Bauer is a redemptive character who is able to undergo probably the largest change of any character in the novel.
One of the more-complicated, lesser characters of the novel, we see in Brittany Bauer a slightly less nuanced version of white supremacy, because we do not have access to her thoughts and feelings. Nonetheless, we also see a grieving mother who has lost her first and only child as well, and the trauma and pain of that make Brittany dive head first back into hatred as her primary motivating factor. It is this focus on her hatred that also becomes the fatal flaw that becomes her undoing. Brit also becomes a symbol for the complexities and absurdities of race, since she is a white supremacist who later finds out her mother is black. This inherently incompatible duality makes her hate herself more than anyone, and she is unable to go through the same redemptive process that Turk goes through, instead committing suicide.
Brit’s father, Francis, represents the old guard of white supremacy, although he has since recognized the need for a new guard. He is akin to royalty in the movement, and his trajectory is almost a mirror image of Turk’s, as both men begin by being overtly racist and then go underground. Further, we see how Francis was radicalized in a similar manner to Turk.
Kennedy is an interesting mixture of the idealistic and the realistic. She knows that she cannot single-handedly change the system of inequality she is actually pretty aware of, for someone who benefits so much from it. In many ways, Kennedy is a sort of avatar for the author, Jodi Picoult, allowing Kennedy to learn the things that Picoult seems to want to express through the novel. Kennedy is a flawed and realistic person; she tries hard to be forward thinking and espouse liberal ideals, and yet she cannot see some of the ways she benefits from white privilege, or the implicit biases she harbors. However, one of her defining characteristics is a desire to improve herself, and to that end she is able to undergo a rigorous self-inventory throughout the novel, ending up in a place of much greater understanding.
Wallace Mercy is a character modeled off of real-life figures such as Al Sharpton. He is a media figure that is divisive and yet also, in Adisa’s eyes and others’, necessary, as he is someone who can vocalize the feeling that others, like Ruth, need to suppress in order to get through life.
By Jodi Picoult