a novel by Tory Hartmann

Agnes Anne O’Hara, a shy 28 year old from an over-the-top Irish Catholic family, is well into her overdue journey to independence when brother-in-law Bruno confesses he married the wrong sister.

Every first Friday of the month, the O’Haras have a huge family dinner. It was at one of these dinners that Agnes Anne announces she is embarking on a new career: real estate. Her father, Malachi O’Hara, is sure his daughter couldn’t sell a bowl of milk to a cat. Knowing her shy nature, he admonishes her to accept the life God gave her. Powerfully attached to the Virgin Mary to the point that her analyst accuses her of having an imaginary friend, Agnes changes her name to Anne and marches forward. Her ultimate goal: an apartment and a life of her own. But speech therapy, a make-over and new clothes excites her lecherous brother-in-law, who confesses he married the wrong sister. Some successes allow her to gather the money for some plastic surgery on her hooked nose and bulbous chin. But when her father finds her in the hospital swaddled in bandages, he accuses her of defiling her “Noble nose and chin,” and throws her out of the house.

Next First Friday, her mother, Irene, sees visions of the Virgin Mary in the roasting pan and says it’s a warning about Anne’s Jewish boyfriend. Pawned off on Bruno and Katie, Anne is forced to endure a few days with them while she searches for an apartment of her own. When brother-in-law Bruno tries to break into her room, she calls 911. He tells authorities he was preventing a suicide. She is held for psychiatric observation.

When her sickly sister dies, her body doesn’t arrive at the wake and her brothers throw prayer books at Bruno. Anne is comforted by Jewish boyfriend Sheldon Goldberg; the guilt over losing her virginity makes her sink into depression. That night, the Holy Water freezes over and she feels it’s a sign she must break up with Sheldon. Her father is sure it means Katie will be cremated and despondently takes to his bed. Anne wonders if Bruno had something to do with Katie’s death. Her parents want Katie interned by Easter. Bruno insists Anne come over to pick up the ashes. She doesn’t want to, but her mother begs. Afraid to enter Bruno’s house, he flies into a fury and begins to pour her sister’s ashes down the drain. As he makes Anne strip off her clothes to get the ashes, she confronts him about Katie’s death. He tries to kill her. She is saved by Sheldon, but as they stand on the top of her car and sink into the San Francisco Bay, her problems aren’t over. Sheldon can’t swim.