56 pages • 1 hour read
Penitence
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Chapters 7-12Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 7 Summary: “1995-1996”
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of child death, death, substance use, bullying, mental illness, and illness.
In 1995, Julian graduates from Middlebury College. He never forgave Martine for forcing him to leave Lodgepole, and the family had spent little time together after Julian moved. He is headed to Columbia Law School, and although Martine is proud, she cannot help but mourn the “happy” blended family she and Cyrus created after her first husband died.
When she, Cyrus, and Gregory attend Julian’s graduation and drive him down to New York for law school, they are shocked to learn that he sold his skis years ago. Julian has mixed feelings about law school. He spent his undergraduate years partying, both because it was fun and because it helped him forget the accident. His guilt remains a tremendous burden, and he has no idea how to move on. He knows that law school will be more difficult and that he’ll have to give up drinking so much. But he’ll be in New York, and so will Angie. The two hadn’t broken up, and they’d been seeing each other in secret for the past four years while she was in art school at Rhode Island School of Design in Providence.
Law school is indeed more difficult, but Julian has no problem buckling down and focusing on his studies. He spends as much time as possible with Angie, who is pursuing her art career while working at a gallery. Julian realizes that he does not want to go into corporate law and is drawn toward defense work after taking a course that presented criminal law in a nuanced light.
He and Angie are blissfully happy together but disagree about whether to tell their families they are still together. Angie knows that her mother will never forgive Julian, but Julian is tired of secrecy. They argue about it and decide not to tell. Julian is struck by how differently they feel about the accident: Angie desperately misses Diana but thinks that skiing accidents happen all the time. It hadn’t been their fault. Julian still hasn’t told Angie the full truth, but this is in part to protect her: If she hadn’t been so intoxicated that she needed to stay behind and vomit, she would have been with Diana the whole time.
Chapter 8 Summary: “November 2016”
Back in 2016, Julian is anxious on his flight back to Lodgepole. His hands shake. He’s returned only twice since leaving: Once for his brother’s graduation and once for his father’s funeral. It is no longer home. He worries that someone will remember his role in Diana’s accident and try to talk to him about it. The woman sitting next to him offers a detailed, although completely uninformed, analysis of Nora’s case. David does not respond or reveal that he will be one of Nora’s lawyers.
Back in Lodgepole, he remains anxious. He does not know how to act around Angie. She’s his only ex-girlfriend. He’d explained the entire situation to Mayumi, his wife, and she told him that people are not defined only by their worst actions. He felt free when she said that, but now, back in Lodgepole, he feels mired in the past again.
Julian and Martine visit Nora. Julian observes how punitive juvenile detention centers are: They do not, as they claim, rehabilitate youthful offenders. They’re just prisons for children. Julian has an easy time talking with Nora. Each time he meets a new client, he channels his insider knowledge of what it is like to do something horrible that you cannot take back. Nora comments that the room is full of flies (it is not), and Julian reflects on the psychological evaluation: The psychiatrist thought it was likely that Nora was experiencing psychosis, catatonia, and hallucinations, but he wanted more time to speak with her.
Julian and Martine meet with Angie and David. Angie will not make eye contact with Julian. Julian and David didn’t get along in high school, but David seems receptive to Julian now. Julian observes the tension between David and Angie and wonders again why Angie moved home and married someone like David.
Julian and Martine explain that Nora will be tried as an adult (The DA is running a difficult re-election campaign and has decided to appear “tough” on crime.) Insanity defenses are difficult, and they argue that it may be best to obtain a plea deal, using mental health as a factor in the sentencing. Julian reaches out to the DA, Gil Stuckey, but Gil is resolutely opposed to a plea deal. Julian can tell that he sees only the worst in people and that he’s already decided that Nora is a monster. Julian does not agree with the practice of trying juveniles as adults: It began during the 1990s, after the passage of a crime bill meant to keep “super predators” off the streets. He worries for Nora.
Chapter 9 Summary: “November 2016”
Life is difficult for Nora in the detention center. She is no longer bullied as much, but she does not fit in with the rest of the girls. It is always cold, and Nora struggles to remember life before. Her parents visit, but she feels no special connection to them. She doesn’t fully comprehend what Julian tells her about her case. She does not like her new medication or the food. She dreams of Nico.
Chapter 10 Summary: “1998-1999”
It is 1998. Julian’s career goes well, even in his early days as a defense attorney. He wins a small case not long after joining a prominent defense firm and is allowed to work, solo, on another, more important case. It is for a pro bono client who committed two crimes as a juvenile and now, because he committed a third as an adult, is facing life in prison because of the three-strikes rule.
His boss takes him out to celebrate the win, but because his boss is also a heavy drinker who insists on round after round, Julian is late to an important dinner with Angie. The ensuing argument lasts for days, and each reflects on how difficult their relationship has gotten: Julian works and drinks too much, and Angie feels abandoned. Julian cannot seem to shake the accident: Angie reminds him of the worst day of his life. But they make up, and each continues to enjoy their new careers. Julian feels energized by his pro-bono case, and Angie is asked to put a piece in an important upcoming show at her gallery. Their fragile peace is shattered, however, when Angie finds out that her father has pancreatic cancer.
Chapter 11 Summary: “December 2016-February 2016”
Back in 2016, Julian and Martine continue to work hard on Nora’s case. Martine finds out that there is a proposed juvenile justice reform bill that would introduce alternatives to incarceration and focus the system on rehabilitation rather than punishment. The DA is the head of the group opposing the bill.
Martine calls Julian to tell him this new information but is interrupted: She has a heart attack and hangs up to dial 911. Julian is back in New York and flies to Lodgepole immediately. Angie picks him up at the airport, and for the first time since he began working on the case, they have a real conversation. Martine will be fine but will need to undergo rehabilitation therapy. Julian feels emotionally pulled toward Angie even though he has just found out that Mayumi is pregnant.
Chapter 12 Summary: “February 2017”
Angie googles Mayumi and thinks that she seems like a good person. She hadn’t wanted Julian back in her life and still resents David a little for calling him. She misses Nico fiercely and, although she knows he’s gone, searches for him whenever she is in public. She still has to care for Livia, whose Alzheimer’s is progressing rapidly. Her mother can no longer speak, so Angie has begun confessing various sins to her. She feels guilty about Diana’s death. She stayed with Julian after her parents forbade her from seeing them. Nora killed Nico, and she does not know how to feel.
She visits Nora and tries to tell her daughter that she is forgiven, but Angie realizes that Livia never taught her how to forgive someone, and she is not capable of it. David works more and more hours and shows clear signs of emotional strain. He and Angie remain distant from each other.
She and Julian meet at her house about the case. He asks her why her paintings are not on display and why she gave up painting. Angrily, she tells him that he has no idea what it’s like to be a parent and that in addition to normal parenting duties, she’d had to care for a child with Huntington’s while managing her other child’s depression. She knew how badly he’d wanted kids and saw the hurt in his eyes. He tells her that he will see her at the next hearing.
Chapters 7-12 Analysis
Julian’s characterization is important during these chapters. In the portions of the novel that flash back to Julian and Angie in their twenties, he emerges as a complex character. His quasi-estrangement with his mother Martine further develops The Complex Nature of Guilt and Forgiveness in that, even years after Diana’s accident, he has not forgiven his mother for forcing him to move away from Lodgepole. He hadn’t wanted to move, and it is evident from his self-medication that he needed more support than was provided to him in the wake of Diana’s death. Martine, too, feels the sting of their separation and notes bitterly that the blended family she “was so proud of had separated like milk when a chef squirts lemon into it” (86). Martine and Cyrus are so disconnected from Julian that they do not know that he gave up skiing in college, and Martine is so paralyzed by their fractured relationship that she does not see this decision for what it is: an indication of emotional distress. Julian has also developed unhealthy coping mechanisms: He spent college partying not only because it was fun but also because alcohol became a form of self-medication: It helped him to momentarily forget Diana. Although he does begin to drink less during law school, he does not entirely give up the habit, and it will adversely impact his well-being and relationships as he begins his law career. During this set of flashbacks, Julian turns from corporate to criminal law. He takes a course that presents criminal law in a nuanced way and realizes that he has a passion for righting the justice system’s many wrongs. He knows that there is inequality and bias in the judicial system. Further, he also understands that he has a unique window into the lives of defendants: He too knows what it is like to make a terrible error in judgment that cannot be taken back.
One of the present-day scenes that features Julian is one of the novel’s key moments of engagement with Media’s Impact on Public Opinion. On the flight back to Lodgepole, he is seated next to a woman who knows about Nora’s case. She asks if he’s heard of it, tells him that Nora is a monster, and then explains that she learned about the case from a short clip she saw on social media. As Martine observed in an earlier chapter, this misinformed woman arrived at a harsh judgment about a complex case after hearing only a tiny snippet of information about it. Julian now observes the extent to which the media shapes public opinion and is shocked and angered.
Julian’s interactions with Nora further reveal Bias and Dysfunction in the Juvenile Justice System. Julian is critical of the conditions in the detention center where Nora will be housed until her trial. Both he and Martine ruminate on how difficult these kinds of facilities are for youth offenders. Many of these young people are traumatized themselves, and the crimes they are accused of are complex and sometimes not entirely their fault. The facility is cold, and inmates often shiver. Julian and Martine are fierce advocates for fairness in the judicial system, and the way that the juvenile inmates are treated is a violation of their rights. The DA’s tough-on-crime stance and his desire to try Nora as an adult despite her young age and lack of a criminal history further highlight the perils of the juvenile justice system. The DA makes it clear that the role of the justice system, even for juvenile offenders, is punitive rather than rehabilitative. There is a bill making its way through the legislature that would reform the juvenile justice system, offering rehabilitative care rather than harsh sentences in even harsher facilities. The DA opposes this bill, while Julian and Martine support it. The broader argument at work in this novel is that the juvenile justice system needs reform and that rehabilitation is a better model than punishment. The conditions in Nora’s detention center, the lack of care provided to her while she is in an obvious state of mental and emotional crisis, and the DA’s lack of empathy all support Koval’s claim that the system is rigged against vulnerable juveniles.
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