Diana O'Toole

Diana O’Toole is the protagonist and narrator of the novel. She is an associate specialist at Sotheby’s, an auction house in Manhattan. The novel takes place before and after her thirtieth birthday, a major milestone in Diana’s life. Diana shares an apartment with her boyfriend, Finn Colson, who works as a medical resident at New York-Presbyterian Hospital. She has a five-year plan for her life that she follows closely until the events of the novel: “securely on the path to my career, married by 30, to finish having kids by 35” (6). She has other goals including learning other languages and traveling. Finn shares the same goals as Diana.

Diana’s complicated relationship with her mother, Hannah O’Toole, has colored Diana’s perspective of the world and her ambitions for her entire life. Hannah was never present in Diana’s life growing up, resulting in a...