Summary

At the outset of The People We Keep, in Chapter 1, April is living by herself in a motorhome. She waits for the neighbor, Mrs. Varick, to fall asleep before secretively taking the old woman’s car to drive to the Blue Moon Café. The protagonist has never played her songs in front of an audience, but she is excited and nervous to join the open mic set at the bar. When she gets on stage to play “two untitled originals” she closes her eyes and “hear[s] her voice coming back to [her] from the corners of the room” (11). The crowd vigorously applauds after her performance and the man who was sitting next to her, before her set, congratulates her performance telling her that she has potential to do something with her music.

The next day, in Chapter 2, April fails her math...