28 Summers

Jake is a central character in 28 Summers because his relationship with Mallory drives much of the book’s conflict. Like Mallory, Jake is caring, a dedicated, hands-on parent, and prioritizes the people he loves over his career. Jake is driven by his desire to cultivate relationships, and to find meaning in his work rather than be driven solely by money or achievement. These desires drive the plot arc of Jake eventually finding work with the cystic fibrosis foundation, which has a mission that resonates with him on a personal and not just professional level. Jake’s emotional fidelity to Mallory is emphasized by his troubled, unhappy relationship with Ursula. When he meets and falls in love with Mallory, Jake is single, a plot device that prevents Mallory and Jake from beginning their relationship with a dynamic of infidelity. Although he later gets back together with Ursula and eventually marries her, it’s clear throughout the story that Jake’s true loyalty is to Mallory, a trait that Hilderbrand uses to elicit the reader’s sympathy for and admiration of the character.

Jake is a relatively static character whose motivations and reactions to the world around him remain the same throughout the book. He doesn’t ever muster the motivation or the desire to break off his relationship—and later, marriage—to Ursula, suggesting that he is risk-averse and values stability (at any cost to himself or Mallory) over novelty. The fact that he has remained with Ursula for so long based almost solely on the fact that she was kind to his sister in middle school reinforces the idea that once he forms an attachment, it’s difficult or impossible for him to consider other factors that might motivate him to dissolve or break it off. This explains why he remains involved with both Ursula and Mallory throughout the story. Mallory reinforces his tendency to remain “locked” into relationships, even as they evolve beyond the point of being healthy, by never asking him to leave Ursula. She also never asks him to show her any external commitment or spend any time with her beyond their chance encounters and annual weekend on Nantucket. Thus, Mallory appeals to Jake’s conservative tendencies, further emphasizing the two characters’ emotional connection.  

Ursula, Jake’s girlfriend and, later, his wife, is high-achieving, competitive, ambitious, and focused on work at the exclusion of other areas in her life. As a middle schooler, Ursula was kind to and befriended Jake’s twin sister Jessica, who was sick with cystic fibrosis at the time. This kindness draws Jake to her and leads them to begin dating in middle school and high school, but over time Ursula evolves into someone completely focused on status, achievement, and prestige:

Ursula was no longer the kind of person who would spend even one hour with a sick friend. She was no longer the girl who would move the arm of the record player back to the start of a song again and again to bring someone else joy. She was no longer Sully and hadn’t been for a long time (63).

Jake feels this coldness directed toward himself as well, as he struggles to find a job: “Ursula is patient and encouraging but the bubble over her head says: Just figure it out, already! It also says: I am too busy to get into the foxhole with you. (The bubble over her head always says this, no matter what foxhole it is.)” (168). Ursula is aware of and even states her faults regarding personal relationships to Leland:

I’m a witch at home. I’m demanding and ungrateful and I have to schedule in family time, though that’s the first thing I cancel when things get busy. I’m aware that if I don’t start having some fun with my daughter, she’ll grow up either hating me or being just like me or both (322).

Nonetheless, Ursula thrives on feeling accomplished, competent, and needed professionally, saying that “I have this idea that if I stop working, even for an hour, the country will fall apart […] I’m addicted to work” (322). Her traits in almost every respect are a foil for Mallory’s character.

Unlike Jake, who is a static character, Ursula does evolve over the course of the story to become slightly more in touch with her emotional side and come to value personal relationships. Her horror at the 9/11 attacks, for example, lead her into politics to try and make her country better for her daughter (210), and the Cavendish trial leads her to vote with her conscience because of her own experience with sexual assault (388-91)—in spite of any political consequences that may result. 

Like Ursula, Leland is driven, competitive, and cosmopolitan. Her friendship with Mallory mirrors Ursula’s relationship with Jake, in which the more assertive and less sensitive character (Leland/Ursula) dominates the more emotional, submissive character (Mallory/Jake). Despite being wealthy and having more connections and resources while they live in New York at the beginning of the book, Leland does not share her advantages with Mallory, instead taking a job they both applied for (12), never sharing the exotic food she could afford with Mallory, who could not (352), and only inviting her on outings as a matter of show (13). This selfish and insensitive behavior continues throughout the book, with Leland insulting Mallory to Fifi (138), using Mallory’s parents’ funeral as an opportunity to network with Ursula professionally (310), and finally writing about Mallory and Jake’s affair with enough identifying details that Ursula figures out who the piece is about (342-43). Mallory attributes many of these actions as Leland’s desire for revenge after Mallory has a one-night stand with Leland’s ex-boyfriend, Frazier, who she’s always felt territorial about. Leland, like Ursula, serves as an antagonist even though Mallory considers her a friend through much of the book. Although the two characters reconcile before Mallory dies (415), Leland is a static character whose attempts to apologize after Mallory ends their friendship seem inadequate. Leland is relatively one-dimensional and her purpose in the story is largely to place Mallory in an unsatisfying friendship. (Apple, Mallory’s friend on Nantucket, is characterized using similar techniques that place Mallory in a nurturing, satisfying female friendship instead. Apple is a foil for Leland.)