Mother-Daughter Relationship

Laura and Andy’s mother-daughter relationship demonstrates how tough love from a parent can help make a child more independent and confident. Laura seems to be cruel to her daughter when she orders her to move out with only a moment’s notice but Laura fears that Nick or another of her enemies will hurt Andy in order to manipulate Laura. Andy at first follows her mother’s instructions carefully and seems afraid to make her own decisions. As she becomes more and more angry with her mother for not telling her the whole truth about her life, Andy begins to develop her own sense of strength. She eventually faces and prevails in situations that once terrified her in order to learn the truth about her mother and herself.

At the beginning of the novel, Andy is a 31-year-old woman who has been coddled into...