Iona Iverson's Rules for Commuting

“The advantage of boarding the train at Hampton Court was that it was the end of the line, or the beginning, depending, of course, on which way you were traveling. There was a life lesson there, thought Iona. In her experience, most endings turned out to be beginnings in disguise.”

This passage establishes the third-person point of view of the novel, with Iona as the central protagonist. Her reflections here about the end of the line also being the beginning of the line introduce the theme of Endings and New Beginnings.

“This job was her life. It was the reason she got up in the morning. It gave her purpose. It was who she was. What would she be without it?”

Iona’s reflection on the part her job plays in her identity introduces the theme of The Complexities of Pursuing One’s Passions. While Iona genuinely loves being an advice columnist, she is also highly dependent upon it for her sense of self-worth—it is “her life” and not just her career. Iona will struggle to reconcile this all-consuming attitude toward her work with the ageist discrimination she faces in her workplace.

“Martha spent a lot of her time feeling like David Attenborough narrating a nature documentary. She was an observer, studying a foreign species, trying to work out their habits and rituals, so she could move among them without being rejected or picked on.”

The reference to nature documentaries narrated by David Attenborough becomes a running joke through the novel, as Martha refers to it again later. Martha’s experience of attempting to navigate complex social hierarchies plays into the novel’s message about The Importance of Making Connections, although Martha’s anxiety here in school will form an important contrast with the more accepting, supportive form of making connections she will experience on