Knowing is Hard to Handle...

It seems to me like every character in the story has some sort of “burden of knowing”. The characters that mainly stick out to me with a burden of knowing are T. Ray, Lily, August, and Rosaleen. I have not yet completed the novel but so far these four seem to know the most and carry the heaviest burdens. T. Ray knows what happened to Lily’s mother and that is his burden. In his own way he is protecting her by not telling her the whole truth about what happened and leaving her in the blank but at the same time he is constantly punishing her for trivial mistakes. Rosaleen has a burden of knowing because part of her knows that Lily is suffering and why but she cannot talk to Lily about it. August has a burden of knowing because she recognizes Lily and knows that her mother came to stay with her and her sisters and she knows part of Lily’s sad story as well but just like Rosaleen, August cannot say anything to Lily.
I think that Lily carries with her the most burden of knowing because I think that deep down inside she knows what really happened to her mother but because of all the pain and suffering she has been through she chooses to suppress this knowledge and live in ignorance because it seems like it is easier for her to do so. Lily is also burdened with the knowledge of how she and Rosaleen ended up at the calendar sisters’ house, she knows that how they came to be there wrong and she also knows that lying to the sisters is wrong yet she continues to do it. There is one point in the story where Lily accidently overhears a conversation that August and June are having and August tells June that she knows that Lily is lying. Because Lily heard this statement from August it makes her feel even worse about lying to her when she has shown such kindness to them.
I think that this story is extremely complex and because each one of the characters has some sort of problem that they are going through or some issue that they are dealing with you have to keep track and pay close attention to every one of them. Though Lily is the main character, her connection with each of the other characters in the story is significant because all of these different connections help her to grow, to experience, to learn, and to accept the issues and the pains that she needs to overcome. I have not finished the story but I do have high hopes for the way that it will end. I believe that Lily will figure out the right things to do in all of the different aspects that she is having troubles. I also believe that each one of the other characters in the story help Lily in her journey of discovery in their own unique way.