How to Read a Book

Violet tells Harriet she is excited about adding a new responsibility to her job: giving guests lab tours. Still, Harriet warns her about working too much unpaid overtime, citing that “You’re a free, independent woman now” (148). They take turns reading aloud from Spoon River Anthology, and one epitaph from Elmer Karr touches Violet as it details how the town forgave him even though he murdered his lover. This makes Violet think about how her family and friends back home can’t forgive her.

Harriet confesses that she has a nagging question about the wreck. She wonders if Troy drove and Violet took the blame to protect him. Momentarily, Violet is flung back into the moment of the crash, where she sees Lorraine’s badly broken body trapped in the car. Instead of trying to help her, she and Troy ran away. She assures Harriet she was driving in the wrong lane, causing Lorraine to swerve and crash into a tree. Harriet apologizes for asking, but Violet can sense a shift, seeing that Harriet wishes it was true.

Violet works with Dr. Petrov in the lab, teaching the birds new tasks. It is her job to observe how they perform and record the results. All the birds except Alan learn the task, and she and Dr. Petrov must model it for the bird to help him learn. The tasks seem silly for a human to perform, but secretly, Violet loves Dr. Petrov’s attention. Mrs. Rocha is resigning to move closer to family, and Dr. Petrov offers Violet her job. She says she isn’t qualified and would prefer to continue to work with the birds. Dr. Petrov isn’t worried about her lack of college education and says she can do both jobs. He asks her to call him Misha, and her attraction to him intoxicates her, although he wears a wedding band. As she’s tending to the birds, Misha hovers behind her, and she is overcome by desire. As he leaves the building, she runs to the window to watch him, and they share a glance.

Violet exchanges tearful goodbyes with Mrs. Rocha, who gifts her a hand-knit blanket. While walking across campus to the bus, Violet imagines herself as a college student one day and suddenly sees Troy walking across campus. She races to the bus stop, clinging to the blanket for comfort. She stares at the blanket in her apartment to remind herself how far she has come.

Sophie calls Harriet to tell her that Luis left her for another man. She wants Harriet to tell her a “Corinne story,” as hearing stories about her mother brings her comfort. Harriet proclaims she never liked Luis anyway and promises to call later with a story. At the prison, security is tighter since state officials are conducting a review. The women are forced to meet in a small room no bigger than a closet, and they’ve all been made to wear colored badges indicating their security status based on their crime. Harriet finds the practice disgusting, but the women are used to it as it happens often. They are more interested in getting into the poetry. They take turns reading aloud from Yeats’s “A Prayer for My Daughter,” which becomes a moving meditation on the grief they each feel for being separated from their children. Dawna-Lynn is meeting with a new lawyer about a new trial and is late. The women end the meeting by writing in their journals. Mr. Flinders stops Harriet on her way out as her bag is searched and says, “Prison […] is not a sorority” (163). She knows he is trying to intimidate her not to get so close to the women, but Harriet refuses to let him affect her.

Harriet goes to the bookstore to find their next poetry book and runs into Violet on the way. She is momentarily stunned at how healthy and happy Violets looks. Harriet invites Violet to the bookstore, but she is wary. Harriet insists, and they enter the bookstore and see a new cat there, which Harriet suggests Violet adopt. Violet worries it will be lonely since she spends so much time at work. When Violet calls Dr. Petrov “Misha,” Harriet knows she has fallen for him. In the poetry aisle, Harriet selects a book of Maya Angelou’s poetry and a book of quotations. Frank appears and asks them to stay put while he gets something. He returns with two large boxes containing exquisite cat-shaped bookends. He offers them as an apology for his earlier actions. Harriet kindly refuses to accept the bookends, and Frank walks away. Violet becomes emotional because she feels guilty that Frank feels he must apologize. She runs out of the store. While waiting in the checkout line, Harriet sees Frank consoling Violet outside. The moment makes her miss Corinne, and she thinks about her parents’ death. The quotation book opens with a line about forgiveness.

While Violet sits outside the bookstore, she thinks back to when she was a child, and her mother called her a “born reader.” Once, Pastor Rick caught her reading Catcher in the Rye in church, but her mother didn’t get angry. When she began dating Troy, Violet read Our Bodies, Ourselves for her sex education. Then Violet’s memories turn to the trial and how exposed and shameful it made her feel. Kristy’s victim impact statement gutted her as her descriptions of Lorraine reminded Violet of her mother. For Violet, enduring the trial, including watching the faces of her family and friends in the courtroom, was worse than incarceration.

Frank approaches Violet and offers her his handkerchief. He tells her she is young and has an entire life ahead of her. He apologizes for scaring her and shares a story about the time he drank too much, drove home, and hit his mailbox. He wants her to know they both made the same mistake; the only difference is that he got lucky. Harriet joins them and listens as Violet confesses to leaving the accident scene. Violet exclaims, “I honestly don’t know how to accept your forgiveness” (176). Frank thanks her for accepting his apology. Violet wants to know if Frank would have fled the scene like her. Frank says one can never know how they will respond. Violet begins crying again, and Frank and Harriet hold her as she asks for her mother.

Frank drives Violet and Harriet to Abbott Falls so Violet can visit her mother’s grave. On the way, she asks him to stop so she can see her house. Violet places red roses on the grave at the cemetery while Harriet and Frank watch from afar. They both discuss how they were raised Catholic but have since fallen away from the faith, though Harriet admits she still finds comfort in praying the rosary. Suddenly, Violet’s aunt and sister arrive to confront her. Violet’s Aunt Pammy asks Violet to leave and takes the roses from the grave. Aunt Pammy says she’s tried to tell God to help her forgive Violet, but He hasn’t answered. Violet pleads to stay and honor her mother while Vicki watches silently. Frank wonders if they should intervene, but Harriet says they must trust that Violet can handle herself.

Aunt Pammy continues with her vitriolic speech, telling Violet that Pastor Rick has advised her to forgive Violet. Violet can’t tolerate the mention of Pastor Rick’s name and confesses that he sexually assaulted her and told her that she should have sex with him to become closer to God. Aunt Pammy calls Violet a liar and demands to know who Frank is. When they recognize him as Lorraine’s husband, both Vicki and Aunt Pammy appear to shrink in size. They apologize to him for his loss and leave. Vicki hugs Violet before leaving but knows she will never see her sister again. While Violet returns the flowers to the grave and speaks to her mother, Frank and Harriet wait in the car and share stories of their experience of losing their spouse. They return to Portland, and Frank drops Violet at the university and returns Harriet to her car. They exchange phone numbers because Frank wants Harriet to keep him apprised of Violet’s progress. Harriet decides to accept Franks’s bookends, and he leaves exceedingly happy.

Her run-in with Vicki and Aunt Pammy makes Violet feel like she is back in prison. She asks Frank to drop her off at the university so she can go to the lab and feel like herself again. On her way inside, she runs into Troy, who is taking summer classes. He mocks her job, claiming that her boss probably thinks it’s “hot” that she’s an ex-con. Violet explodes, asserting that she paid the total price for her crime, and he got off scot-free even though he was involved in the accident. Moreover, his family and community forgave him because he was a local football star. She not only went to jail but also must face the fact that everyone she knows has disowned her. Violet admits her lawyer tried to get her to implicate Troy, but she refused. Even now, she realizes she loved him too much, which blinded her judgment. He calls her a “Bible-thumping bitch-whore from Stickney Street” (195), and she quickly walks away from him to the lab.

Violet puts on her lab coat, which instantly makes her feel better. She discovers that the student running this shift in the lab put the birds to bed two hours too early. It’s vital to the bird’s health that they stay on a strict schedule, and she shouts at the student for his selfish mistake. Using Misha’s words, she explains that the birds have given up a life of freedom in the wild to aid in the research, and the least they can do for them is give them a good life. The student becomes defensive and angry, telling Violet she was a “sympathy hire” because of her criminal record. She fires him and spends the next few hours singing to the birds before putting them to bed. Misha arrives with a stack of papers he’s working on for a grant proposal. She offers to stay and help, but he doesn’t want to overburden her, and he says, “I need you” (201). Violet is powerfully attracted to him, but his papers spill, breaking the spell.

Harriet is back at the prison for Book Club, and to celebrate the completion of their Yeats study, she has the women write love poetry. Dawna-Lynn doesn’t want to write about a man, but Harriet tells them they can write about anything. Dorothy from the kitchen brings them water, and they pretend they’re pouring fancy drinks. Jenny Big writes to her dog. Jacynta writes her love poem to her younger self and reads it aloud. The women ask Harriet to read her poem, and they think it’s about Lou, but it isn’t. Dawna-Lynn is angry because she didn’t get a new trial. When she curses at Jenny Big, the guard they call “Stoneface” tells her to watch what she says. Dawna-Lynn snaps back, “Watch your own mouth, fuckwad” (205), and the guard tackles Dawna-Lynn, restrains her, and removes her from the room. The women are unfazed, but the event leaves Harriet shaken. Stoneface forces them to end Book Club early, and Harriet hands the ladies their copy of the Maya Angelou book, their next assignment. She realizes Stoneface heard her poem, and she feels exposed and embarrassed. Mr. Flinders takes extra time searching her bag as she leaves.

After having dinner with Frank and Harriet, Violet returns home, and Misha calls to ask her to check on the birds. It is late, and Violet thinks she hears a woman’s voice on the other end, but she loves the birds and lives to please Misha, so she agrees to go. The eerie darkness of the empty lab reminds Violet of all the horror movies she’s seen where terrible things happen to women. She and Troy used to watch them together and then have sex afterward, which she didn’t enjoy. Later, in prison, Dawna-Lynn taught the women about consent, and Violet realized that Troy never asked her permission.

All the birds are okay, and despite Misha’s instructions to leave them in the cage, Violet takes Ollie out of his cage and into the OB lab. Ollie doesn’t do well with the tests, and Violet feels that Misha has been ignoring the bird, so she pays him extra attention. She sings to Ollie, and he repeats some of the verses. Suddenly, Misha appears and instructs Violet to leave Ollie and come outside. She fears he is angry with her, but he is impressed that she’s been teaching the bird. He invites her into his office and says, “You love me” (214), and he kisses her. The kiss is passionate and nothing like Violet has ever experienced. They have sex on the couch, and Violet is enraptured.