Lucy

Lucy is the first-person narrator and main character of the novel. As a young girl, Lucy lives in a rural town in Illinois with her parents and siblings. She grows up exceptionally poor. She and her family live in a diminutive house with very few amenities. Her mother is a violent woman. Her father suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder, which causes him to act in sexually explicit and inappropriate ways. Despite his odd behavior, Lucy loves him. When it comes time for Lucy to leave for college, she is terrified. Her life has been so sheltered and abusive that she has no idea how she will face the world beyond.

In her sophomore year at college, Lucy meets William. William is older than Lucy and working as the teaching assistant for her biology class. They soon grow close. Lucy finds in him a rare and comforting sense of...