Annabelle McBride, the novel’s 11-year-old protagonist, is skinny with brown hair and eyes. She is the eldest of the three children in her farming family, and she feels that the months leading up to her 12th birthday are charged with the opportunities that help her to learn and come of age. Most of all, despite her awareness that she is a speck in an unfathomably vast universe and that she cannot control events, she learns how to be accountable for her actions and decides that she cannot take “refuge” and ignore the wrong-doing in the world (291).

Annabelle’s independent spirit and sense of responsibility is evident from the outset when she decides to deal with Betty’s bullying herself, rather than telling the adults. Her capacity to observe and make decisions based on her perceptions is also remarkable for a girl her age. Her maturity enables her to see Toby as more than an eccentric potential threat to the community and allows her to receive, and be moved by, the story of his hardship.

Despite her courage, Annabelle often experiences the responsibility for Toby’s safety, the heavy trauma of his stories, and the need to keep secrets from her family as a “burden” (2).