Kathryn Lyons is the protagonist of The Pilot’s Wife. At the time the story begins, Kathryn is married to Jack, who is 15 years older than her, and is mother to Mattie, her 15-year-old daughter. Kathryn grew up in Ely, raised by her grandmother, Julia.

Kathryn’s parents had a stormy and dramatic relationship that ended in their tragic deaths when she was a teenager. This early experience with grief, as well as the example of her parents’ marriage, have deeply informed Kathryn’s relationship with Jack, as well as her idea of what a good marriage looks like. She also has firm ideas about how she should behave, which boils down to being as different from her mother as possible: “Kathryn had vowed not to complain [...] But the price for such steadfastness, Kathryn soon realizes, was the creation of a subtle gauze all around her, a veil that kept her and Jack just beyond easy reach of each other” (64). At the beginning of the novel, Kathryn is in denial about the state of her marriage. As the novel progresses, Kathryn is constantly forced to reevaluate the effects of the distance between her and Jack, and to reevaluate her understanding of what a good marriage is.