51 pages • 1 hour read
Jamie McGuireBeautiful Disaster
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2011A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 1-9Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 1 Summary: “Red Flag”
Abigail Abernathy attends her first fight at the Circle, an underground fight club at Eastern University, with her best friend, America Mason, and America’s boyfriend, Shepley Maddox. Shepley’s cousin, Travis Maddox, is the reigning champion of the Circle. In her pink cashmere cardigan and pearl earrings, Abby feels like “a schoolmarm on the beaches of Normandy” (2). She pushes forward to see better and is sprayed by blood when Travis crashes an elbow into his opponent’s nose. After the fight, Travis steadies Abby when someone in the crowd pushes her. He tells her the sweater looks good on her, then disappears.
The next day, Travis enters the lunchroom cafeteria with two blonde sorority girls whom Abby thinks of as the Barbie twins. One attempts to sit on his lap, but he pushes her off when the girl insults America. Travis flirts with Abby and calls her Pigeon. Shepley warns Abby not to fall for Travis, and she says she won’t: “He oozed sex and rebelliousness with his buzzed brown hair and tattooed forearms, and I rolled my eyes at his attempt to lure me in” (8).
Travis sits next to Abby in class and invites her to his apartment. She dresses down in an attempt to appear unattractive. America says Abby will provoke Travis’s interest by brushing him off, since he’s used to women trying to catch his attention. Abby learns that Travis is a local who won scholarships to attend Eastern University. He holds an A grade in all his classes and is a criminal justice major. He learned to fight growing up with a dad with an alcohol addiction and four brothers.
Travis takes Abby out for dinner, and they ride his Harley motorcycle. When Abby scolds him for driving fast, Travis says he wouldn’t let anything happen to her. He tells her his mother died when he was three. Abby shares that America’s parents practically raised her. The soccer team is also in the restaurant and Travis thinks they are making fun of him for being on a date. The server flirts with Travis, and Abby warns Travis that she won’t sleep with him. He agrees they’ll be friends, a first for him.
Chapter 2 Summary: “Pig”
In the cafeteria, Travis insists on sitting next to Abby, and she feels a bit smug about winning his attention. Travis helps Abby with her homework. Abby meets Parker Hayes, one of Travis’s fraternity brothers. Travis and Abby get teased as no one can believe Travis would have a platonic relationship with a girl, and Abby thinks others don’t understand Travis as she does. Shepley tells her everyone thinks Travis is “this asshole, but if they only knew how much patience he has dealing with every girl that thinks she can tame him” (31).
When Travis misses a class to talk to a girl, Abby is irritated. Parker invites her to a fraternity party. The boilers that heat the water for their dorm break, and America insists that she and Abby stay at Shepley and Travis’s apartment. When the girls arrive, they find Travis in his boxers saying goodbye to Megan and declining to take her phone number. Abby scolds Travis for sleeping with someone he doesn’t want a relationship with and calls him a “pig.” Travis decides Abby will sleep in his bed because he has sex on the couch. Abby notes that Travis’s bedroom is nearly bare. She doesn’t let on that she is excited by being in bed with him. Travis says he won’t have sex with her because he likes her too much, and Abby feels rejected. Travis insists on taking Abby to the party at the fraternity house instead of Parker.
Chapter 3 Summary: “Cheap Shot”
Abby is annoyed that everyone on campus assumes she and Travis are sleeping together. She tells him she doesn’t “want the whole school to think I’m one of your sluts” (48). Travis offers to take her to a biker bar with America and Shepley, and Abby accuses him of wanting to pick up another “STD-infested imbecile” (50). Instead, they decide to go to a classier place, and Abby dresses up. Travis is impressed by the girls’ fake IDs, and America says Abby has connections.
At the club, Travis fends off other women and tells Abby he wants to sleep with her but feels she deserves better than him. They dance, but when Travis kisses her neck, Abby says she would never get drunk enough to let him get her on his couch. A guy named Ethan starts talking to Abby, but Travis drives him away, telling Abby that Ethan was charged with sexual assault. Abby is pleased that Travis says she is beautiful, confusing, and making him “crazy.” She continues to sleep in his bed at his apartment and lays her head on his chest as they go to sleep. Shepley says Travis doesn’t let many people close, and Abby realizes the lines of friendship are getting blurred.
Chapter 4 Summary: “The Bet”
Travis likes Abby because she doesn’t put up with his “bullshit.” He tells her, “I don’t know why you put up with me, and I don’t know what I’d do if you didn’t” (68). Travis agrees to a fight, and he and Abby make a bet. If he doesn’t let his opponent land a single punch, Abby must stay at his apartment for a month rather than going back to her dorm. If he gets hit, he’ll abstain from sex for a month. Abby agrees to the bet. Travis wins the fight, bloodying his opponent without taking a blow. When Abby asks him why he made the bet, he says, “Everything’s better when you’re around” (76). Abby notes a peaceful manner about him, a kind of contentment when she is near.
Abby continues sleeping in Travis’s bed. Shepley is worried that Travis will screw up with Abby and endanger Shepley’s relationship with America. Abby insists to America that she would never get involved with Travis, but she is hurt when Travis brings home two women and has sex in the living room. The next morning, Travis enters with grocery bags of Abby’s favorite foods. Abby tells him he can bring home whomever he wants and she will stick to the bet. Travis admits he was mad when he overheard Abby telling America that Travis isn’t good enough for her.
Chapter 5 Summary: “Parker Hayes”
Abby wears a sexy dress to get Parker’s attention at the frat party and tells him that she and Travis are not in a relationship. She yells at Travis for being jealous of Parker but then undresses and climbs into Travis’s bed. Travis continues to insist he can’t be what Abby deserves. Abby dates Parker, who admits he is nervous about being with the woman Travis Maddox loves. Abby meets Parker’s mother, who is glamorous and cool to Abby. Parker kisses Abby goodnight while Travis waits at the apartment door. Again, Abby sleeps in Travis’s bed.
Chapter 6 Summary: “Turning Point”
In the cafeteria, Abby realizes everyone thinks she’s sleeping with Travis and Parker. She asks Travis to let her out of the bet. He refuses, saying he still has three weeks with her and “I’m not giving that up for lunchroom gossip” (112). Abby continues to date Parker, assuring him not to worry about her and Travis. Parker kisses her in his car, and Travis, who has been drinking, confronts them. Abby yells at him that she is a virgin and was just making out. In his bedroom, Travis approaches Abby, then says he doesn’t want to be with her while he’s drunk. Parker gives Abby a diamond tennis bracelet for her birthday. Abby is angry with Travis for forgetting that they almost had sex. He says she’s driving him to distraction and asks what they are doing. Abby doesn’t know.
Chapter 7 Summary: “Nineteen”
Abby feels divided “into two separate people: the docile, polite person [she] was with Parker, and the angry, confused, frustrated person [she] turned into around Travis” (129). She tells herself that Travis is a bad relationship bet, but America says that if Abby told Travis she wanted him, he would never look at another woman again. Travis, Shepley, and America surprise Abby with a birthday party. The football team challenges Abby to take 15 shots of tequila. When Shepley is concerned and Travis is shocked that Abby can drink so much, she tells them she’s been playing this game with her dad since she was 16. Parker arrives and dances with Abby, then takes her outside to talk, but she says it’s rude to leave her guests. She drinks all her shots and dances until morning.
Chapter 8 Summary: “Rumors”
Abby wakes up on the bathroom floor. Travis is asleep beside her. America and Shepley fight over Abby’s drinking. Abby goes back to the dorm with America, who rants about how she’s seen Abby rob her dad of hundreds of dollars in drinking games. America is mad at Abby for dating Parker when Travis has tried to reform his behavior for her. America accuses Abby of using the bet as an excuse to be near Travis. She tells Abby, “Travis is what you want, and Parker is what you think you need” (145). America knows that Abby is worried she will end up with a guy like her dad, but she says Travis isn’t like that. Abby replies that she “didn’t leave everything behind to have everyone here look at [her] the way they did in Wichita” (146).
For her birthday, Travis gives Abby a Cairn terrier puppy. She names him Toto. On campus, Abby learns she is being judged for her behavior because people think she made out with Parker at her party and then went home with Travis. When a football player asks if he can have a shot with Abby, Travis attacks him, punching the boy repeatedly. Abby grabs his elbow and screams at Travis to stop. He retreats to the apartment, and Abby goes into his bedroom to talk to him. He tells Abby she should walk away from him or she will hate him later. He can see Abby is hurt by what people are saying and he doesn’t want her hurt because of him. The four friends go out to dinner. When they come home, Abby tells Travis she doesn’t care what people are saying and she is tired of defending their friendship. They lie down in bed together.
Chapter 9 Summary: “Promise”
Abby decides she doesn’t care about the gossip surrounding her relationship with Travis. Parker stops talking to her. Abby’s friend Finch says she’s hiding something: “The cardigans, the demure sophisticate that goes to fancy restaurants with Parker Hayes […] that’s not you” (162). Abby admits she came to Eastern to escape her father, who drinks, gambles, and has a bad temper. She wanted to “start fresh, without the stigma of being the daughter of a drunken has-been” (162). Her father, Mick, is a poker player. When Abby turned 13 and started winning poker games, Mick started losing. He blamed Abby for stealing his luck and nicknamed her “Lucky Thirteen.” Abby thinks being with Travis will mean going back to that life.
When Abby complains in the cafeteria that everyone is watching them, Travis stands on a table and sings to take attention off her. Parker asks Abby if he can take her out after her month with Travis is up. Abby spends the next two weeks with Travis, and he cooks dinner for her last night in the apartment. They do dishes with the dog at their feet and then go to bed. Abby kisses Travis and tells him she wants him. They have sex, and Travis says he is Abby’s last first kiss.
The next morning, Abby sneaks out and has America drive her back to the dorm. To America, she says she hates goodbyes; she tells herself Travis will regard the incident as mere sex. She avoids Travis’s calls. America says Travis trashed the apartment because he was so upset Abby was gone. America is scared by the intensity of Travis’s rage. When Abby calls him, Travis says she can’t just drop out of his life. Abby tells him she needs to sort things out. She tells America she can’t be with Travis. America says Travis isn’t Mick, and Abby says she will turn into Mick if she’s with Travis. Parker calls and invites Abby out to dinner, and she accepts.
Chapters 1-9 Analysis
Abby, the protagonist, tells her story from the first-person point of view, which limits the action to her own experiences and perceptions, giving the reader intimate knowledge of her feelings. Abby’s age (18 turning 19) places the story firmly in the new adult genre, and the college setting signals that Abby is entering a major transition in her life, leaving behind her childhood in Wichita, Kansas, where Abby and America went to high school, and starting her new life as an independent adult.
One of the key themes introduced in these chapters is The Impact of Reputation and Image. From the beginning, there is a disconnect between the person Abby was in the past and the person she believes she wants to be. Abby is trying on a new persona in an attempt to figure out who she wants to be in the world. This waffling is consistent with her age and phase of life—transitioning from childhood to adulthood. Is it also consistent with the instability she experienced in childhood, which underscores the significant Influence of Family and Background. Though she has been exposed to adult influences from a young age—specifically gambling and drinking while her father spent his time in Vegas casinos—Abby does not yet have the emotional maturity of an adult. She’s still learning to be intuitive about herself and others, still figuring out how to define herself and her desires, which makes her a somewhat unreliable narrator. She hasn’t yet learned how to be honest with others or even herself—and thus with the reader, creating opportunities for internal and external conflict.
In the book’s first act, which covers Abby and Travis’s initial relationship up until the first time they have sex, Abby’s dishonesty about her motives creates a great deal of tension, to the point of making Travis “crazy.” She wants to project a demure image, that of the “good” girl, by wearing a cashmere cardigan and pearls, a strategy reminiscent of Legally Blonde protagonist Elle Woods, who goes from sorority princess to law student to win back her boyfriend. Yet Abby shows glimpses of her real self when she pushes forward to be close to the fight, fascinated by Travis and not the least bit repelled or concerned when she’s splattered with blood. This establishes a consistent corollary in the novel between violence and sexual attraction. In some ways, the novel paints Travis as a potential abuser, setting up a tension between the relatively puritanical sexual politics of the novel and the taboo impulse to romanticize a person who relies on aggression and dominance to make their way through the world.
This tension is heightened by Abby’s behavior toward Travis and the way their intentions toward each other are muddied. For Abby, it’s easier to recognize what she doesn’t want than what she does. She recognizes Travis’s pattern with women and tries to set herself apart by declaring her disinterest in his sexual advances. Once she has secured his attention, she agrees to be friends—a privileged position, since Travis notoriously does not have female friends. Abby’s readiness to sleep in Travis’s bed with him, though she’s a virgin and he’s a stranger, suggests she’s excited by intimacy, but she wants it on her own terms, though she’s not yet sure what those terms are.
Furthermore, though she tries to encourage Parker’s romantic advances, deeming him an appropriate romantic interest, Abby’s fake ID and comfort level with drinking, which at her age is an illegal activity, show that she is not entirely comfortable or at home in the cashmere-clad coed persona. She dresses provocatively to stir male interest when she attends clubs or parties, and she is drawn to the dangerous and risky. Parker, the stereotype of the “good” guy, bores her.
These early chapters also generate conflict in the clash between Abby’s “good girl” posture and Travis’s established identity as the “bad boy”—classic archetypes of the romance genre. This conflict speaks to The Power of Physical Attraction: Travis is known for his temper, aggression, and casual approach to sex, yet this makes him a magnet for women in the novel, who continually approach him and compete for his attention. He fits squarely into the “reformed” rake archetype, a trope of enduring appeal in romance fiction: the sexually promiscuous man who is uninterested in relationships with women becomes passionately devoted and faithful when he meets the “right” woman. Shepley references this appeal when he remarks on the women who want to “tame” Travis. The novel sets up an underlying narrative strain that suggests romance between genders is a type of mutual conquest; Abby and Travis’s relationship simultaneously engages in that idea and rejects it.
Abby feels satisfaction at being special to Travis, feeling early on that she understands him better than other people. This distinction later evolves into an “us against the world” dynamic, another staple theme of passionate romance fiction. The blank walls of Travis’s bedroom signal his readiness to be reformed by Abby. With little to identify his personality or preferences, he is a tabula rasa primed to be imprinted with experiences. More specifically, he is a blank slate on which Abby can imprint someone desirable and worthy.
Travis indicates Abby’s privileged status in his life by placing her in his bed, an intimate space of private access, rather than the couch in the apartment’s public space, the site of his many sexual conquests. His preferential treatment is perhaps a response to her self-defined image as a “good” girl, yet it also serves as further indication that he is eager to cross boundaries with her. Abby’s outward performance of goodness often contrasts with her behavior: She has a fake ID, engages in binge drinking, and isn’t frightened by Travis’s aggression. Abby’s lack of sexual experience is the primary marker of her “goodness” in the novel, and the character dynamic between Travis and Abby reinforces a traditional, heteronormative idea that Abby’s (or any woman’s) virginity is a “prize” for a man to win.
For Abby, the relationship is an opportunity to experience a control over her own life that she was denied growing up. She takes pride in her ability to calm and soothe Travis, but she also seems to enjoy her ability to provoke strong emotion in him, including attraction (as when he kisses her neck at the club), jealousy (which she provokes by letting him observe her interactions with Parker), and hurt and rage when she sneaks out the morning after they have sex. Abby also views her choice between Travis and Parker as a question of identity: She must decide what type of person she wants to be—a “good” or “bad” girl—by the person she chooses to be with.
The emotion is intensified by the attention Travis and Abby receive from others. Eastern University’s atmosphere is more reminiscent of a small high school than a college campus with several thousand students. Abby’s inconsistent response to the attention speaks to her still emerging sense of herself and her conflicted desires. While she claims to dislike how she is perceived in her relationship with Travis or Parker—particularly objecting to being viewed as sexually promiscuous—she also enjoys her status as the favorite of Travis Maddox, campus celebrity. Though she complains when she is the subject of gossip or attention, she also seems to expect it, perhaps because of the reputation and measure of fame she had in her father’s world during her childhood. Again, the real concern for her is one of power and control—she wants to shape her identity on her terms, including in her relationship with Travis.
Many of the character traits that the novel romanticizes in both Abby and Travis are precursors to emotional and physical abuse, but the story’s characters make allowances for them; for example, Travis’s aggression, drinking, promiscuity, and obsession with Abby are ascribed to the emotionally devastating loss of his mother. Abby herself romanticizes these qualities, seeing them as part of his “bad boy” appeal, all “sex and rebelliousness” (8). His rage when she leaves is, for Abby, a demonstration of sincerity and depth of attachment. She doesn’t question how he has transformed from a man who wouldn’t take a woman’s phone number to cooking her dinner, giving her a dog, and insisting she sleep in his bed every night, all indicators of a domesticity for which neither of the protagonists will turn out to have appropriate role models. In keeping with the trope of the reformed “rake” or the “bad boy,” Abby assumes that Travis has fully developed nurturing abilities and is simply waiting for the right partner to express them.
