Thief River Falls

Toward the beginning of the novel, a 10-year-old boy appears in Lisa’s yard, unable to remember his name or where he came from. The boy insists he’s in danger. Lisa agrees to protect the boy, and decides to call him Purdue, after the boy of a similar age in her novel, Thief River Falls. Lisa describes Purdue as having “long blond hair, which kept falling across his eyes. Those eyes. So smart, so blue, so curious” (268). Purdue is a serious, pensive boy who quickly becomes attached to Lisa. She promises to do anything to help Purdue, even if she endangers herself in the process. Lisa describes knowing where Purdue is as being “like a mother’s sixth sense, part of the connection between them” (252), which illustrates the deep bond she feels between herself and Purdue.

However, at the end of the novel, it is revealed that Lisa had a son named Harlan who recently died of cancer. The boy Lisa calls Purdue looks exactly like Harlan. Unable to cope with the death of her son, Lisa imagined a version of Harlan was still alive. By the end of the novel, Lisa even observes how “pictures she’d seen of Danny as a ten-year-old child could have been pictures of Purdue. Danny’s hair, Danny’s eyes, even some of Danny’s expressions when he looked at her” (268), which actually describes how much Harlan looked like his father. Finally, Lisa must accept that Harlan is dead, and that Purdue never existed.

Denis Farrell is the county attorney of Thief River Falls. He lives with his wife, Gillian. Denis is also Danny’s father. Denis can be aggressive and intimidating. After the deaths of his son, Danny, and his grandson, Harlan, Denis observes that he “dealt with his grief by getting angry. He liked control, he liked power, and grief took those things away. Gillian was right; he felt impotent. When he felt that way, he had a need to strike pack at whatever was causing his pain. He had to find someone to blame” (39). This quote illustrates how Denis likes to be in a position of authority, and how he turns to anger and blame in difficult times.

Denis and Lisa have never gotten along. Denis had big plans for his son, Danny, to move out of Thief River Falls and attend law school, and when Lisa and Danny began dating in high school, Denis resented Lisa for distracting Danny from his plan. Denis didn’t approve of the marriage between Lisa and Danny. When Lisa wrote her novel, she named the villain after Denis. However, by the end of the novel, Denis and Lisa make amends. They share their grief over losing Danny and Harlan and Denis even admits he thought it was somewhat cool being the bad guy in Lisa’s book.

Noah is Lisa’s twin brother. As children, Noah and Lisa were close. Noah was friends with Danny and introduced Danny and Lisa. Lisa remembers sharing a bedroom with Noah as a child, hiding together in the crawlspace in their basement, and visiting the cemetery with Noah and Danny as high schoolers. Noah is certain that he and Lisa share a telepathic connection as twins: “Throughout his life, there had been moments when he was all alone and he would hear Lisa say something, as vividly as if she’d been standing next to him. There were other times when he didn’t hear words but simply felt a torrid rush of emotion, whether it was joy, or anger, or grief, or fear” (122). Unfortunately, after the tragic deaths of their family members, Noah’s grief becomes too much and he abandons Lisa, disappearing to Fargo. In Fargo, Noah meets his fiancée, Janie. For most of the novel, Lisa resents Noah for leaving her and refuses to try to communicate with him. However, Noah can sense Lisa is in trouble, and by the end of the novel, he returns to Thief River Falls to help her. Noah and Janie decide to move back to Thief River Falls in order to be close to Lisa. At the end of the novel, it is revealed that Noah and Janie are pregnant and plan to name the child Danny.

Laurel is a psychiatrist who works at the hospital in Thief River Falls and who lives on a hobby farm with her husband, Curtis. At the beginning of the novel, Lisa describes Laurel March as her best friend. Laurel works at the hospital and was there for Lisa during difficult times in Lisa’s life. At the end of the novel, it is revealed that Lisa is Laura’s patient of a couple of years. Lisa describes Laurel as “the calm head whenever Lisa found herself in the midst of a panic attack” (17) and describes how Laurel “conveyed a sense of unflappable calm that Lisa envied” (44).

Danny was Lisa’s fiancé. Danny and Lisa met in high school. Danny and Lisa broke up briefly after high school when Danny left town to attend college. Danny’s father didn’t approve of Danny and Lisa’s relationship, and encouraged Danny to attend law school. Danny eventually dropped out of law school, returned to Thief River Falls, proposed to Lisa, and became a firefighter. Lisa became pregnant with Danny’s son, a boy to be named Harlan, but unfortunately, Danny volunteered to fight fires in California before ever learning that Lisa was pregnant. Danny died in the fires in California about ten years before the novel begins. Throughout the novel, Lisa blames herself for not stopping Danny from going to California.