Looking for JJ

Anne Cassidy

Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2004

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Summary

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 1, Chapters 1-4

Part 1, Chapters 5-7

Part 1, Chapters 8-10

Part 2, Chapters 11-13

Part 2, Chapters 14-16

Part 2, Chapters 17-19

Part 3, Chapters 20-22

Part 3, Chapters 23-26

Part 4

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

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Discussion Questions

Part 1, Chapters 5-7Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 1: “Alice Tully”

Part 1, Chapter 5 Summary

Alice meets with Jill to talk about the posters. Jill tells Alice that her mother has been in contact with Pat and asks whether it’s true that she has sent her a birthday card. Alice admits that she has sent the card, but she agrees with Jill that she doesn’t want to reestablish contact with her mother. Jill tells her that they can either get a judge involved to keep the detective away from her, which would stop his investigation but could result in increased press coverage, or they can ignore him and hope for the best. Jill tells Alice that she’s organizing funds to get her a mobile phone.

On the train ride home, Alice reflects on a memory of her and her mother Carol six years before, back when she was still Jennifer: They’ve packed all their belongings into a van and plan to leave behind Perry, Carol’s boyfriend. They both get into the van along with the driver, Danny. They move into a new cottage in Berwick and unpack their things. While Carol and Danny unpack upstairs, Jenny explores the house. She sees another girl of a similar age in the yard next door. Jenny goes upstairs and glimpses Carol and Danny having sex. Back on the train, Alice feels melancholy as she thinks about her mother. She reflects that she is “carrying a heavy load into that new life. A lot of baggage from the past, weighing her down” (42).

Part 1, Chapter 6 Summary

Alice discovers that the detective’s name is Derek Corker after seeing another flyer on the Student Union noticeboard at Frankie’s school. Frankie doesn’t seem to recognize the girl in the picture, and Alice is relieved. Frankie is moving back to Brighton after the semester ends. Alice thinks to herself about the day before, when Frankie had gifted her with a gold necklace. He tried to have sex with her, but Alice told him that she’s a virgin and wants to wait for the right time.

Back at the bar, Frankie goes to get them drinks while Alice reflects on her college plans for next year. Frankie invites her to visit him in Brighton over the summer, and Alice spies the detective sitting at the bar. The detective notices her as well and tries to talk to her when she gets up from the table, but he reveals that he only recognizes her from the coffee shop. Alice heads back to the table and tells Frankie she has to leave, and he walks her to the bus stop.

Part 1, Chapter 7 Summary

At home, Alice looks at a picture of her mother that she has tucked away in a drawer. Alice’s mother was beautiful, and Alice had loved her. Carol was a model and was away a lot, so other people often looked after Jennifer. After a while, the modeling jobs dried up, and Carol was out of work. When Carol got another modeling job after a long dry spell, she leaves six-year-old Jennifer on her own in the house while she goes out to the job. Carol began to leave Jennifer alone more often. Alice realizes that “in those early days her mum hadn’t actually abused her. She’d simply deserted her, cast her off. Abandoned her” (78). In the present day, Alice goes into the kitchen and where Rosie is cooking dinner and gives her a hug, thankful for her warm, supportive maternal presence.

Part 1, Chapters 5-7 Analysis

In these chapters, we learn more about Alice’s relationship with her birth mother. While Carol seems to love Jennifer, she also seems unstable and unpredictable. We learn that Carol had Jennifer at a young age, and was only in her teens and 20s when Jennifer was a child. The novel portrays Carol as sexually promiscuous, sleeping with boyfriends and other men who do her favors, sometimes even when Jennifer is in the same room. Jennifer’s reticence to have sex with Frankie echoes these earlier memories, reinforcing the ways in which sex can be much more fraught for women than for men. The photograph that Alice has of her mother hints at the importance that photographs might play later in the novel, and it also represents her mother’s beauty, youth, and vanity.

These chapters reveal that Alice was neglected as a child, which may be a contributing factor in her crime and subsequent punishment. Although Alice has not been physically abused, she has been raised in an unstable environment and often subject to neglect. Her mother is an unstable caregiver, cycling in and out of work and between boyfriends. These chapters dwell on the theme of abuse and neglect and the lasting effect it has on young children, setting the reader up to better understand how Alice could have committed her crime. In the present day, however, Alice’s life with Rosie represents an oasis from the chaos and violence of her previous life. Rosie is depicted as a stable maternal figure who selflessly cares for her foster daughter.

Although Alice’s fears over being discovered largely subside after the detective fails to recognize her, she is still nervous about being discovered. She thinks of her identity as Jennifer Jones and her identity as Alice Tully as fundamentally incompatible and worries that her life as Alice would cease to exist if she were found out. The novel again touches on themes of guilt and identity as Alice struggles to reconcile her past and present lives.