We Deserve Monuments

Letty Harding is Avery’s grandmother and Zora’s mother, sometimes called “Mama Letty” by Avery and Simone. Letty is considered to be cantankerous by her neighbors, Carole and Simone, who nevertheless enjoy her company. Letty has been estranged from her daughter for many years, due to two overarching conflicts. Letty was a neglectful and emotionally abusive parent and also misused alcohol for much of Zora’s childhood. She also objected to Zora’s romantic relationship with Carole, which alienated her daughter further as a teenager. When Zora left for college, Letty stubbornly refused to answer her letters, increasing the distance between them. When the novel opens, Avery has only met her grandmother once, 10 years prior, on a trip where Zora and Letty viciously argued. The Andersons only return to Bardell because Letty is dying of terminal cancer.

As the novel progresses, Avery learns more about her grandmother and becomes closer to her because of this knowledge. Letty tells Avery stories of her grandfather, Ray, who was murdered by Jade’s grandfather in a racist hate crime when Letty was pregnant with Zora. Zora and Letty are ultimately able to discuss the events of Zora’s childhood, and Letty apologizes for her abusive parenting. She regrets her anti-gay attitude when she learned of Zora and Carole’s relationship, which she frames as being born out of fear: She worried that Zora would face the same violence as her father, should Bardell at large know about her daughter’s relationship with another girl.

Letty dies near the end of the novel; after her death, Avery finds a shoebox full of newspaper clippings and a gun, which imply that Letty was Amelia Oliver’s murderer. This is confirmed through one of the interludes, which frames Letty’s choice as retribution, through which she chose to take away someone the Olivers loved in exchange for them taking away Letty’s love. The text does not explicitly moralize about this choice, but Zora and Avery decide to keep Letty’s culpability a secret.

Zora Harding Anderson is Avery’s mother and Letty’s daughter. She is a renowned astrophysicist with an impressive academic career, though she downplays these accolades when she returns to Bardell after many years. Zora often promotes the Anderson family motto “focus forward,” something that her daughter initially finds comforting and inspiring but later feels is something her mother uses as an excuse to avoid discussing the pain of her past. Zora’s reluctance to share her painful histories with Letty and Carole leads to an initial rift between mother and daughter.

Zora’s decision to explain her past trauma to Avery brings the two closer together. They bond over their mutual LGBTQ+ identities; while Avery is openly pansexual, Zora admits to still considering identities but currently frames herself as bisexual. When Letty eventually apologizes to her daughter for the abuse that Zora suffered from her mother as a child, Zora accepts the apology without framing this as erasing the trauma of her past. She expresses her love for Letty shortly before Letty’s death and continues to protect her mother’s reputation after Letty has died; when Avery discovers evidence that Letty killed Amelia Oliver, Zora quietly hides the evidence without revealing her mother’s culpability.

Simone Cole is Avery’s next-door neighbor, friend, and eventual girlfriend. Avery develops a crush on Simone quickly after meeting her, though she spends a portion of the novel assuming that Simone is straight. Simone later confides in Avery that she is a lesbian, though she wishes to keep this a secret due to her fear that she will face even more prejudice as a fat, Black lesbian than she already does from classmates who spew racist and anti-fat rhetoric at her. She also fears that her mother, Carole, will not support Simone if she knows her daughter is gay. This fear is initially borne out, though Carole eventually works toward being more understanding after Simone’s older sister reminds their mother that she will “lose” Simone if she continues her bigotry.

Simone, for most of the novel, feels isolated from her two closest friends. She believes Avery cannot understand her because Avery’s parents are supportive of her sexuality and because Avery plans to attend college—possibly an elite university. Jade, she posits, cannot understand her because Jade is white and straight. Simone feels herself trapped in Bardell because she does not feel she can leave Carole alone. Despite this, she dreams of attending Spelman College, a historically Black women’s college in Atlanta, longing to follow in the footsteps of Georgia Governor Stacy Abrams. Ultimately, Simone does attend Spelman and feels that her friends understand her better, despite the lingering differences between them.

Avery is occasionally jealous of Simone due to Simone’s closeness with Mama Letty. Eventually, however, the two girls bond over their mutual love for and grief over losing Letty.