Piglet

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of disordered eating.

“There had been roast chickens back in Derby, but her mother’s were always anemic, trussed at the legs and moistened only by a gravy that had started life as a spoonful of granules. For dessert—or afters, as her father would say—there would be an apple pie from Morrisons bakery or a roulade from the frozen aisle, depending on the season, eaten on the sofa in front of the television.”

The connection between Food and Class in Great Britain is an important theme in the novel. This passage describes the simple food that Piglet’s mother served in their working-class home in Derby. The references to granular gravy and frozen desserts reflect her mother’s relative lack of funds and her penchant for ready-made food, which offers a stark contrast to Piglet’s obsession with fresh ingredients and elaborate meals.

“He would tell her thirteen days before their wedding, and she would feel his words lodge like a shard of bone between her ribs.”

Each chapter of the novel ends with a brief epigraph like this one that reveals the inner thoughts of Piglet and other characters in the novel. These interstitial epigraphs help build tension as the wedding day approaches and Piglet prepares for her new life. In this instance, the revelation that Kit will tell Piglet a world-altering secret 13 days before the wedding creates a sense of suspense that tempers Piglet’s excitement about the marriage.

“They were still close—of course they were close—but Margot’s family was growing in a direction away from Piglet, as she had planned it, as she had always known, and there was something hurtful about this choice: Margot striving ahead, as she always did, sure of herself, making a unit of her own rather than waiting for Piglet, leaving her behind.”

Piglet’s changing friendship with her childhood friend Margot is an important source of tension throughout the novel. This passage suggests that Margot’s pregnancy makes Piglet feel insecure, as if her friend is proceeding down a path that she can’t follow. The growing distance between Piglet and Margot is a destabilizing force in Piglet’s life, even though Margot is Piglet’s maid of honor.