Wife

The wife is the main character and primary first person narrator of the novel. Her first person narration guides the opening eight sections of the novel. For this reason, her character is referred to as the narrator throughout the majority of the guide.

In the narrative present, the narrator is 40 years old. She and her unnamed husband have been married for 13 years. They live “in the most beautiful house in the neighborhood” with their two children (24, 25). Although the narrator arguably has everything for which she has always longed, and “can’t hope for anything more,” the narrator has trouble ignoring “the void” that she constantly feels in her life, home, and marriage (6). Her feelings of internal unrest, the reader quickly learns, are primarily inspired by her obsessive regard for and distorted dynamic with her husband. Although she insists that she is still desperately in love with him, the...