Reply To: TBC: Each chapter takes on a different point of view of the women at the boarding home.

I am not sure why Kate Quinn chose to devote a chapter to the principal characters/women of Briar House but it served to really develop the character of the individual women and still move the story forward.

As others have said, Grace was the character/resident whose point of view and actions seem to drive the story and the lives of the women (and some men). But the point of view I found compelling was Reka’s. She is the one, besides Grace, who knows life under an autocratic government, knows what it is to fear, be taken advantage of and, ultimately, to successfully move on and claim what was taken.

Both Arlene and Mrs. Nilsson are undeniably self-centered and selfish. I can, sort of, forgive Arlene to a point. I am not sure she has the emotional capacity to see others as people who have intrinsic value despite their difference and deserve respect. Mrs. Nilsson seems more fundamentally malicious and self-serving. Peter and Lina are her children.

I found the dedication of an entire chapter to a character provided a nuanced and detailed picture of the individual and never seemed to lose the thread of the story.