Annie John

Now 15 years old, Annie is unhappier than she dreamed possible. She feels that everything she used to love has turned bad. Whenever her mother says that Annie’s way of doing something reminds her of herself, Annie purposely changes her methods and even tries to find a method that her mother doesn’t like. She believes, without evidence, that her mother intentionally praises things that are special to her just to compel her to give up or change her habits. Annie thinks of her mother and herself as having two faces now: one to show Annie’s father and the world and another to show one another. In company, they behave kindly toward each other, and Annie is often soothed by her mother’s attention. However, once alone, Annie feels that she has never loved and hated someone as she does her mother, and she struggles to reconcile these feelings. In the past, hating someone meant wishing them dead, but she doesn’t think she could live without her mother.

Annie recounts a new recurring dream in which she walks along a shaded road, thinking to herself, “My mother would kill me if she got the chance. I would kill my mother if I had the courage” (89).