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Rose Mueller is the champion of 12th Annual Daughters of America Cup. She hails from a suburb of Dallas, Texas, where she lives for the rest of her life following her tournament victory.

Rose’s life is defined by her struggle with her suburban Catholic identity. Rose finds comfort in prayer and in sacrament, but does not like the community that her religion fosters. This stems from her childhood experience of being bullied at Catholic school. Rose is unsure whether she was bullied because she was reserved or because she was always very tall. In any case, this culminated in an incident where she was locked in an equipment shed for half a day. Though Rose’s parents responded quickly by moving her to a public school, they continued to bring her to the same parish adjacent to her old school. This meant that Rose could not avoid the same religious community that bullied her in the first place.

Rose’s reserved character, as well as her experiences with bullying, make her uncomfortable with attention. During her fight with Iggy, she has to imagine there are no spectators so that she can fight well. Outside of the attention she gets, Rose’s fighting style is described as being resilient and agile. She can quickly change stances to distract her opponents. When Iggy gives her a black eye, it does little to affect her psychological performance during the fight.

Rose loves boxing because she sees it as a way to access another world, much like the one she sees through the clear water of her favorite Dallas building, Fountain Place. She also appreciates that boxing is the one part of her life where people want to be with her without having to know her. This is why she feels love for Tanya during their fight.

Rose goes on to work as an accountant. While experiencing obesity, Rose starts a weight-loss gym with her husband. She surprises herself by discovering that her body still knows how to do her signature move, the leaping left hook, many years after the tournament. Rose will have a son with whom she plays some of her favorite childhood games, like Chubby Bunny.

Artemis Victor is the youngest member of the Victor legacy boxing family, making her an early favorite to win the tournament. Though Artemis progresses through the semifinals, Rachel Doricko defeats Artemis during their fight on the final day of the tournament.

Artemis is defined by her relationship to her family legacy. Her eldest sister, Star, is a former tournament champion, setting a standard for Artemis to follow throughout her youth. If she loses the tournament, Artemis believes that she will be seen as the weakest of the Victor sisters. If she wins, she will not only prove that she is as good as her sister, but she will also prove that she is better than the status that her legacy family grants her. This will give her the freedom to build a life outside of the Victor family legacy, which she prizes more than the championship title itself. Although the Victor family members are celebrities within the Women’s Youth Boxing Association, they struggle with their poor financial and social status outside of sports. As an adult, Artemis is no longer involved in the boxing world, working as a wine distributor.

Artemis is described as being thick-muscled. As part of a legacy family, she is conscious about her appearance. One thing that sets her apart from the other contenders is that she wears makeup during fights. She also has long hair, which she doesn’t cut because she feels her hair is an essential part of herself. She uses her beauty to tell herself she is better than the other fighters. Consequently, her opponents are annoyed by her appearance, which allows her to take advantage of their emotions.

Artemis’s boxing form is described as being “polished,” which she developed by training in front of a mirror that allows her to see herself from all angles. This is her secret strength as a boxer. Her arrogance causes her to underestimate Rachel, thinking she can beat her slowly. Rachel uses her affinity for strangeness to adapt to Artemis’s style and ultimately defeat her.

Andi Taylor is the first boxer introduced in the novel. She is the underdog of the opening match against Artemis Victor, making her one of the characters who help to establish the structure of the novel. Described as being “gangly,” Andi has an “inelegant” boxing form that often gives way to carelessness. When she turns desperate during her bout with Artemis, she throws punches, allowing the more calculated Artemis to turn her desperation against her.

Outside of boxing, Andi works as a lifeguard at a public swimming pool. Sometime before the tournament, a young boy drowned at the pool while Andi was on duty. Unable to administer resuscitation, Andi waited for the paramedics to arrive, at which point they announced that the boy had died. Andi feels complicit in his death, but uses her salary anyway to pay for entry into the tournament.

The novel reveals that Andi wants to win because it will convince her that she is more than just a failed lifeguard or someone who has engaged with death multiple times in her life. Before the drowning incident, Andi had also discovered her divorced father’s dead body. Andi’s mother had divorced him because she claimed he was a bad person. Andi internalizes this moral assessment and believes that she has inherited her father’s badness. When the boy drowns at the pool, it only validates her beliefs, and Andi’s mother’s new family further exacerbates that validation. Andi feels that her mother prefers her younger half-brother over her. No family members accompany Andi to the tournament, as they are unable to appreciate her skill as a boxer.

Andi’s loss to Artemis marks her retirement from boxing. After the tournament, she will go on to attend community college and become a pharmacist. Much of her adult life will see her looking for imperfections in herself.

Iggy Lang is defined by her relationship to her older cousin, Izzy. Iggy clearly looks up to Izzy, as evidenced by her decision to follow Izzy into boxing. On their way to the tournament, Izzy comments that it would be nice to be a dog. Throughout the tournament, Iggy wishes that she could be a war-hero dog. Iggy’s respect for Izzy informs her decision to fight her earnestly during the tournament. Iggy is willing to let Izzy win, but she also wants Izzy to earn her victory. Iggy sees their fight as a contest for respect within their family and their local community.

Because they have sparred several times in the past, Iggy knows her cousin’s fighting habits. This enables her to misdirect Izzy during their fight. Her familiarity with Izzy also proves to be her disadvantage later on in the tournament since she no longer knows how to plan around Rose.

Iggy is characterized by the purple birthmark that runs over her lip. As an adult, Iggy will use this birthmark to force people to be honest with her. This will allow her to lead a successful career as a private investigator. She is also described as a temperamental fighter. Whenever she loses to boys at the gym where she trains, Iggy throws a fit. Iggy introduces the motif of the world discus, which Rachel believes is more coherent than the one Izzy has built for herself.

Tanya Maw is the first fighter that Rose Mueller faces in the tournament. Her character arc revolves around her family life, which outsizes the importance of her participation in the tournament. When Tanya was young, her mother chose to leave the family because she was tired of the life she was living. This made Tanya feel unwanted, though her close relationship with her older sister helps to relieve her of her self-loathing thoughts. Tanya’s memories of her mother’s abandonment are represented by the circular kilim rug in her childhood home. The rug continuously appears to Tanya like a spectral vision during her fights. She will keep seeing it until she dies.

Tanya introduces the symbol of hand-clapping games, which she learned from her older sister. This hints at the way she finds sisterhood in boxing. She is one of the few boxers who isn’t sore about losing and stays on to observe the rest of the tournament. At the end of her fight with Rose, she hears a hand clapping just before they shake hands.

Tanya will become an actress in Los Angeles. Her brutal honesty allows her to fit well into grandmother roles, though this implies that most of her career will see her struggling to break out until she ages into her typecast. At one point, she will be cast as a mother who abandons her children, reminding her of her own mother. The emotional difficulty of playing her mother will drive her to seek support from her older sister. It is described as the worst performance of her career.

Izzy Lang is Iggy’s older cousin. She is characterized as having a perfect memory, which Iggy uses to taunt her when she loses their fight.

The novel covers Izzy’s second and final attempt at joining the Daughters of America Cup. She is annoyed that Iggy has followed her into a sport she has claimed for herself. She is consequently embarrassed whenever Iggy throws a fit because it reflects on her as her cousin and the only other girl at the gym. Later, it is revealed that her insecurity toward Iggy has been something she has struggled with since they were children. After Izzy loses their bout, she compares herself to the sunset, marking her retirement.

Izzy will go on to work in university admissions, but will remain nostalgic for her athletic career because she keeps passing by a boxing gym where two girls are sparring. Although she seldom sees Iggy, the sight will remind Izzy of the joy she found in the sport. This sight also foreshadows the end of the novel, which suggests that there will always be girl boxers, even when the novel characters retire and die.