The Most Wonderful Crime of the Year

Ethan is fairly static, but he is nonetheless a complex, round character who only adopts a charming façade to hide his insecurity and painful past. Maggie routinely describes him in ways that draw attention to his habit of curating his personality for others, but she eventually realizes that he uses this strategy to gain acceptance from others in the public sphere. On the plane, when she sees the long scar on his back, she contemplates the difference between the gritty reality of this old wound and the superficial nature of his public persona. Believing that his façade is meant to gain his audience’s admiration, she cannot understand why he has not used his scar in service of this self-serving goal; whatever caused the scar could earn him sympathy and admiration, but he chooses not to discuss it at all, and this fact hints at hidden depths to his character.

Ethan’s secrecy about his past becomes more suspicious to Maggie when Eleanor mentions that he was born in Germany. In that moment, Ethan’s mask slips, and Maggie notes, “Most people would have missed it, the split-second gap […]—two film reels that didn’t quite line up and if you replayed the moment in slow motion, you could see the place where he was spliced together” (61). Later, as the intimacy between Ethan and Maggie develops, Maggie learns about Ethan’s history in the Secret Service, his painful relationship with his father, his mother’s abandonment, the accident that changed his life, the lasting effects of his injuries, and his stint in rehab for alcohol addiction. She realizes that he adopted his façade for his own emotional protection, not to harm or deceive others. In truth, Ethan is highly emotionally intelligent and very perceptive, and he uses his strengths to support her rather than to manipulate her. Unlike Colin, who “used to look at her like he could see through her, […] Ethan looked at her like he […] could see right into the heart of her” (172). In this way, Ethan stands as a foil to Colin, who only used his insight to control and abuse Maggie. Throughout the novel, Ethan uses the same ability to learn how best to care for Maggie, consistently showing his sincerity and genuine interest in her physical and emotional well-being.

Eleanor Ashley is Maggie’s idol, professionally and personally. When Maggie describes Eleanor to Ethan, who initially pretends that he isn’t familiar with the famous author, she says, “Eleanor Ashley has written ninety-nine novels of perfection. She’s the world’s greatest living author and the greatest crime writer of all time, and so help me if you mention Sir Arthur Conan Whatshisface I’m going to disembowel you with an emery board” (34). Eleanor is a prolific and popular writer who has constructed meticulously detailed narratives that illustrate her scintillating intellect. The edged tone of Maggie’s effusive praise suggests that she is fiercely protective of Eleanor and believes her to be a tough, resilient woman. Maggie boasts that Eleanor is self-made and “only went to school through the sixth grade because her family needed her to work” (34). She praises Eleanor’s successes as if they were her own, and she feels deeply connected to this woman even though they’ve never met.

Eleanor’s charismatic demeanor makes her a towering presence in the novel, even after she disappears. As Maggie notes upon first meeting her in person, Eleanor “looked like a painting come to life, the story of an avenging angel who fell to Earth a thousand years ago, then decided to stick around” (35). In this way, Carter associates Eleanor with powerful, divine beings who are associated with moral good. Although the 81-year-old writer is physically frail and prone to falls, her frailty does not extend to her mind or her sense of justice. She masterminds the entire plot, engineering her disappearance from a locked room after carefully planting multiple clues and inviting her “suspects” and her “investigators” to her home. As Maggie notes, she looks “like someone who was working on a plot and pulling at strings” (39), as though she is the puppet master of a grand production or her own making. Eleanor herself hints at the mystery to come when she admits to Maggie and Ethan that she “like[s] a twist” (35). In short, she is a formidable individual whose experience as an authorial mastermind places her on par with canonical mystery writers like Agatha Christie and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.