Chapter 6 Summary and Analysis

Karen is gradually drawn in and desensitized to her husband's criminal lifestyle. At first, Henry brings home $135 a week as a "bricklayer," and she does not suspect he is anything other than a bricklayer. She realizes he makes some money on the side selling cigarettes and that he sometimes carries a gun, but she insists on blinding herself to these signs because her mother insists on calling them to her attention. Karen gives herself the same excuses she gives her mother, but as she gets to know the other wiseguy wives, Karen quickly realizes their talk centers on jail time. The wives know which prisons are good and which bad. No one talks about what their husbands do to earn jail time; the women focus on how the cops are picking on their men. She notices the other wives look bad...