Themes

The major theme of this book is the need for love and companionship.

Paradoxically, this need is often accompanied by a reluctance to form a permanent attachment, to truly love someone and accept his love in return. The book suggests that Theresa's refusal stems from the lack of self-regard (no one could really love me once he knows me) and the fear of loss. The result is a painful loneliness, which Theresa fills indiscriminately by having sex with the nearest available warm body.

Theresa's first and best companion was her brother Thomas, who visited and read to her throughout her illness, but he was killed in a training-camp gun accident at the age of eighteen, devastating her entire family. She spends her life, unconsciously, trying to replace him and realizes, only at the very end but is unable to express the thought, that James could and does fill...