Strong-willed and tough, Isabel is the glue that holds her band of friends together, though she doesn’t always realize this herself. Isabel’s fierce loyalty and longing for family drive her to take care of her sister even as she suffers the heartbreak of Ruth’s rejection. Over the course of the book, Isabel must learn to admit to her softness and vulnerability, rather than burying them in her remarkable capacity for persistence and hard work.

These issues come to a head in her relationships with Curzon (for whom she feels a deep, unspoken love) and Ruth (whose fears she must imagine, acknowledge, and understand to heal the rift between them). The slow, often painful broadening of Isabel’s perspective brings together the book’s themes of love, hope, courage, and persistence. Curzon’s nickname for her, “Country,” hints at how these aspects of Isabel’s personal journey reflect the growing pains of newborn America.

Curzon is idealistic, generous, and bighearted, and he often tempers Isabel’s anger and toughness with his quiet empathy. While Isabel at first sees his desire to fight for the Patriots as shortsighted and deluded, in truth it’s born of a sincerely-held hope for a better future, no matter how imperfect the present might be.