Mother Daughter Murder Night

“Ma, that’s not what I mean. You don’t get to replace my furniture. You don’t get to redecorate my house.”

Beth and Lana deal with interpersonal conflict in the novel as they have spent many years apart and now must learn to live in close proximity to each other. They do not respect each other’s priorities, and as a result, they frequently step on each other’s toes, creating rising narrative tension throughout the novel’s early chapters.

“Strange feelings of confusion and jealousy rose in Beth’s stomach.”

Here, Beth demonstrates the complexity of her feelings about her mother. She rejects much about her mother, and because of this, she feels jealous when she sees her mother comforting her daughter.

“Lana watched them get up from the table and fingered the pills in the pocket of her robe. She was six days away from chemo, which meant a bad week was starting. She felt short of breath, her lungs laboring to push out a hacking cough that made her eyes water. Not that her girls noticed. They were focused on each other now, shuffling to Beth’s bedroom in a tight huddle of hugs and whispers. No ‘You okay, Ma?’ Not even a ‘good night.’ Lana felt the energy drain out of the room, the tide of love receding.”

Just as Beth is jealous about the relationship between Lana and Jack, Lana feels jealous of the relationship between Beth and Jack. She already feels rather irrelevant because of her inability to work, and the close relationship between her daughter and granddaughter makes her feel irrelevant to them.

“Lana sniffed at the wine. ‘Please,’ she said. ‘Not everything is about racism or discrimination. This is just good old-fashioned incompetence.’”

Lana is the first to recognize the police abuse. She is well aware of sexism and how it works against women. Still, she does not always understand the degree to which race can affect people of color.

“Hal’s daughter, Diana, on the other hand, had no interest in conversation. Diana was older than Martin, a frosty Carmel matron who approached the nurses each Tuesday and Thursday morning with a faint but unshakable look of disapproval. She fell into the camp of visitors who held themselves distant from the nursing home staff, out of either haughtiness or, more likely, fear. If they didn’t build relationships with the staff, they could hold on to the fantasy that their loved one’s stay was temporary.”

These words help to characterize Diana as the fierce and competent person that she is. She gets her work done and is not overly sentimental. Her distance is also a mask for her emotions, a way for her to deny the seriousness of her father’s situation. Lana struggles to let go of a similar emotional distance in her relationship with Beth.

“She wasn’t going to just sit there waiting for the detectives to move along. She might be sick, but she wasn’t incapable. She was going to find a way to clear Jack.”

Here, Lana finds a motive to join the investigation. She wants to help her granddaughter, but she also wants to prove herself useful. These are both strong motives and keep her working until she solves the case.

“‘Jack didn’t ruin my life, Ma,’ she said, her voice filling the room. ‘She saved it. She got me out from under you.’”

Beth asserts the important role her daughter serves in her life. At the same time, she rejects her mother by saying that having her largely out of her life is what saved her. Once Beth realizes that Lana’s judgment is no longer a threat, she can begin repairing their relationship.

“This is a terrible week. First, to lose Ricardo, and now Señor Rhoads…My colleague Ricardo Cruz, he was working with Señor Rhoads on a big dream. This ranch, this one property, will enable us to make the entire northern bank of the slough a wildlife protective zone. Señor Rhoads and I agreed to form a partnership years ago, and Ricardo was working with him to finalize the details. It will be the largest conserved wetland in the western US, saved forever from development and extractive practices.”

These words help establish a motive for murder. They reveal Martin and Diana’s motive because the two want to get the land away from the trust. It also ties Hal and Ricardo together, providing the first clue as the murderer’s true motive.

“Jack, I’m not in charge of this investigation. I don’t call the shots…But I think you have the right to know you’re no longer a serious suspect. As you said, Mr. Cruz died before your shifts even started. You went to school that Friday, right?”

Here, Detective Ramirez shows that she is more fairly minded than Detective Nicoletti. She is not supposed to give Jack information, but she lets her know that she is no longer a suspect. It also shows that Ramirez, unlike Nicoletti, respects Jack and treats her as a trustworthy individual.

“Your mother is always supporting others, Jack. It’s a good thing. Noble, even. She loves you more than she loves herself…But you have to love yourself the most. No one else can do that for you.”

Here, Lana explains her life philosophy to Jack. She believes she is different from Beth because Beth gives more than Lana does, but Jack sees the two women as being similar because they both are strong women who both built solid lives and loved those around them.

“My mom might not be a Prima. But she did all this…on her own. I think you’re more alike than different.”

Here, Jack provides insight into the two main women in her life. Where Lana and Beth believe they are both very different, Jack sees them as being similar. Beth and Lana’s abilities to accept this will form the basis of their newfound relationship.

“It started after Dad left, before Ma became a big shot. We’d melt cheese on bialys and watch in her bed. Mother-daughter murder night, we used to call it. It was our little ritual.”

Beth describes what she saw as happy days with her mother when she was young. What she does not understand is the stress Lana went through trying to provide for the both of them when she had very little resources. The inability to see Lana’s perspective is one of the main reasons that Beth has remained distant from her mother.

“Your father struck me as so grounded…Like an oak tree.”

More than the rest of the characters, Hal was connected strongly with his land. Land is an important motif in the novel as it provides security, power, and healing. It also is a point of contention and represents the country’s problematic history of land theft.

“By midnight, Jack had finally fallen asleep. Beth rose to close the curtain over the tiny window and check on her mother one more time. No change. In her pocket, she turned over a heart-shaped rock she’d found that morning in the spindly grass. It was pumice, rough and speckled, its surface pockmarked like a tiny moon. Evidence of the life she’d chosen, the home she’d built, as far from her mother’s sleek, hard-edged world as possible. For the first time, Beth considered everything Lana had lost when she came to Elkhorn: the power she wielded, the energy that fueled her battles, the freedom to make her own path. Beth put the stone on the nightstand next to her mother and prayed Lana would keep fighting.”

In these lines, Beth finally begins to see her mother’s point of view. Her empathy extends to her mother as she understands the difficulties her mother must face as she is forced to live at Beth’s house. This moment of empathy is a gateway for greater understanding.

“She seems…complicated…Strong women often are. I like her. We’re having lunch later this week.”

Here, Lana explains her understanding of Diana. She feels a kindred relationship with the woman because they both seek power and class. Their relationship represents The Struggles of Powerful Women as each face gender-based discrimination in pursuit of their goals.

“American history is so messed up…The white people straight up stole that ranch from Mexicans. The Mexicans likely stole it from the Native people too.”

These words explain the difficulty in land ownership, particularly in America. This is the inequity that Victor and Ricardo try to right with their land work. The land’s ultimate use reflects this vision even though Ricardo does not live to see it.

“She stared at her phone, wondering. How was it possible she didn’t know more people in Jack’s life? Her connection to Jack suddenly felt paper-thin, the surface of a dark body of water. Jack was paddling out, into the deep, and Beth had no idea where.”

Jack and Beth have a strong relationship. Still, there are aspects of Jack’s life that Beth does not know about. Beth could use this insight to help her understand her own mother’s perspective in their relationship, but at this point in the novel, she still cannot relate to her mother.

“It’s because we trust each other…You tell me what’s going on, and I respect your right to make your own choices.”

Here, Beth explains to Jack the basis of their relationship. This conversation happens after Jack goes missing, and it shows the importance of trust in any relationship.

“A tinkling bell by the waterfall at the entrance to the Peninsula Pines dining room announced Lana’s arrival. The maître d’ ran his eyes down from her dark bob to her tasteful skirt suit, his obsequious smile transforming into a genuine grin when he saw the Alexander McQueen boots on her feet. He guided Lana to a table that looked out over the rose garden, where Diana Whitacre was sipping an iced tea.”

These words demonstrate the power that can come with class and money. Lana is treated respectfully solely because of how she dresses. This is a power she fought for, and she enjoys feeling valued.

“They’re calling it an indigenous farm incubator…Offering below-market leases to women and disadvantaged entrepreneurs…It means they’ll charge less than what a farmer would ordinarily pay.”

This is the plan that ultimately leads to the murders because it is a plan developed between Ricardo and Hal. Besides providing Martin with a motive for murder, it demonstrates one way that land can be used equitably.

“That’s the beauty of the people we love…No matter how well we know them, there’s always more to discover.”

Familial love is a key theme throughout the novel. These words explain one reason that Beth and Lana were able to mend their relationship: They were willing to look at each other with new eyes. These words are not spoken about their relationship, however. Beth is speaking about Martin’s relationship with his father when she does not yet know that Martin is the killer.

“She’d seen what happened to the careers of women who were foolish enough to show those kinds of weaknesses.”

Beth uses these words to describe her decisions when her daughter was young. She was determined to provide for the two of them, and this required her to separate her professional life from her personal life. In hindsight, Lana wonders if she created too much distance between professional role and her role as a mother.

“Lana wondered what kind of car Diana drove. But she also found herself reconsidering her earlier certainty about Diana’s guilt. It was possible Diana knew about the day planner Lana had seen, and she set a fire to try to remove evidence of her meetings with Ricardo. But it didn’t seem like her style. It was easier to believe that someone else, someone angrier, someone with more knowledge of the land trust building, might have done it.”

Here, Lana shows that she understands Diana in a way that other people do not. She understands her because of their similarities, but this causes her to be biased in favor of Diana. At this point, the killer’s identity is not known, so there is a chance Lana is dismissing Diana’s guilt prematurely.