Critical Ananlysis Week One, Blog One (A Complicated Kindness Miriam Toews) 1/3 of the Novel

“He tells me that life is filled with promise but I think he means the promise of an ending because so far I haven’t been able to put my finger on any other.
If we could get out of this town things might be better but we can’t because we’re waiting for Trudie and Tash to come back.
It’s been three years so far.” (Toews, A Complicated Kindness 5)

This quotation is said by Nomi, the protagonist, reflecting her thoughts on her father’s optimism when he tells her about life’s promises. She cannot find a meaningful promise or reason to her life because she is still apprehensive to move on since her mother disappeared and left a gaping hole in Nomi’s somewhat dismembered life.

She blames her mother’s disappearance as the reason for her not being able to leave the town, because she’s relying on her return. With the right approach, Nomi could find this proclaimed promise anywhere – including her own town, but she blames the town for her personal misery and therefore needs the reassurance of believing that her mother will come home, and that is the true reason why she won’t leave.

This quote was chosen because it shows Nomi’s naivety as a character. It was also found to be an important insight to both Nomi’s background and the novel’s development, almost giving clues and opportunity for the reader to predict the novel’s outcome, foreshadowing the fact that Trudie most likely will never come back. If she hasn’t come home in three years, there’s a great possibility she will never return.

This is a significant quote because it reveals Nomi’s weaknesses as a character – her dependence on the comfortable and her resistance to take chances and be resilient. The author doesn’t usually expose the protagonist’s weaknesses so early on in a novel, (page 5), but Toews wanted to set ground for the readers to get to know Nomi as an individual. The fact that it’s been three years already and Nomi doesn’t clue in the possibility of her mother never returning, Toews proves Nomi’s almost feeble attitude towards life.