Debbie is Gail and Max’s daughter. The narrative focuses on her wedding to Kenneth, and she is characterized in large part by her relationship with him. Although the author provides few details about their actual relationship, Debbie is forgiving when it surfaces that Kenneth may have cheated on her. The issue is never fully resolved: Debbie claims that it was all a misunderstanding, but both Max and Gail realize that there are multiple possible explanations. He may have lied to her and she chose to believe the story, he may have confessed and she chose to forgive him, or he might not have cheated at all. In any case, Debbie goes through with the marriage despite her mother’s protests. She explains her actions to her mother as her father tries on suits on the morning of her wedding: The lack of forgiveness in her parents’ marriage instilled in her an appreciation for forgiveness, and she is determined not to, as her mother has, hold grudges that impact her relationships. Debbie does not have the full story of her parents’ divorce and does not truly understand the way that forgiveness (or the lack thereof) shaped the end of their relationship, but she does adamantly refuse to repeat what she perceives as her parents’ mistakes. 

Debbie is also characterized by the ease with which she gets along with the people in her life. Here, she differs markedly from her mother, who struggles with The Complexities of Familial Relationships more than Debbie. She has a comfortable relationship with Kenneth’s family even though they are, as Gail observes, quite different from hers. She loves her parents and is close to both despite Gail’s meddling in her life and judgmental response to her life decisions. After the wedding, she happily calls Gail and Max to thank them for the role that they played in the ceremony. Because Gail lets the topic of Kenneth’s cheating go, the three are poised to continue their happy relationship.

Max is Gail’s ex-husband and one of the novel’s primary characters. He has a job working with at-risk students and is a passionate, caring educator. Max is “exceptionally kind-hearted with both animals and children” (32). He enjoys his work, even though it is low paying, because he wants to provide a supportive presence to struggling students. Much more so than Gail, he is drawn to the field of education for the affective bonds he forms with the young people with whom he works. Max is also compassionate toward the other people and animals in his life. He chooses to begin fostering cats because he wants to make a difference in the lives of needy animals, and he realizes before Gail does that a cat might provide her with just the companionship that she needs. 

Max is also empathetic toward Debbie. He refrains from passing judgment on Kenneth and, more importantly, understands that the choice to marry Kenneth (or not) is Debbie’s: Even if it comes out that Kenneth did cheat on Debbie, Max argues that Debbie has the right to marry him anyway. Max is also understanding toward Gail. He forgave her for having an affair and chose to remain married to her rather than ending their relationship, and this decision structures his understanding of Debbie’s situation. He knows firsthand that the choice to forgive is deeply personal. It is Gail who chose to divorce Max years after the affair: Although he forgave her, she sensed that he no longer felt the same way about her. Even so, Max struggled in the wake of their divorce, and their relationship became strained. By the time the novel begins, however, he is much kinder to Gail than she is to him: He accepts Gail’s faults and is willing to overlook irksome behaviors. It quickly becomes clear that Max still loves Gail and that many of his actions—e.g., finding her a teaching position at his school—are attempts to nudge them toward reconciliation while respecting Gail’s boundaries. 

This is itself evidence of Max’s growth since the divorce, as one of Gail’s complaints about him is that he did not always respect Gail’s space or time. Indeed, even Gail notes that he now cleans up after himself and does most of the cooking: Gone is the man who “generated hillocks of clutter wherever he sat” (31). Because of the way that Max has grown and changed over the years, he is part of this novel’s broader examination of how The Nuances of Aging alter both individuals and their relationships: As Max matures, he becomes a more thoughtful person and also has an easier time maintaining his relationships.

Kenneth is Debbie’s fiancé and then husband. Although he plays a central role in the narrative, Tyler provides very little information about his character. Tyler is known for strong characterization, but the character development in this novel is uneven, in part to place greater focus on Gail, Max, and their relationship. This is more a novel about The Nuances of Aging and The Complexities of Familial Relationships than it is about young people and new relationships. Thus, Tyler presents Kenneth almost entirely through the lens of what other characters know about him. This lack of characterization, especially compared to figures like Max and Gail, heightens the mystery surrounding his character and emphasizes the way others see him.

One of the central conflicts in the novel is the possibility that Kenneth cheated on Debbie. While his sister, Elizabeth, is quick to believe the worst about him, Debbie would rather believe the best. Gail, too, is poised to help Debbie cut him out of her life, but Max is adamant that he and Gail give Kenneth the benefit of the doubt. The narrative never fully resolves the cheating issue: It is possible that he did cheat on Debbie, that she forgave him, and that the two concocted a cover-up story. It is also possible that Kenneth cheated and lied about it but Debbie believed the falsehood. It is also possible that Kenneth did not cheat on Debbie at all. The lack of resolution here is deliberate: The author wants to draw attention to the murky ethics that sometimes impact human relationships. Her characters are forced to make decisions without the benefit of absolute knowledge, just as many real-life families must also navigate complex situations without knowing the full truth. 

The ambiguity in this situation also helps the author explore other characters. Debbie, because of her own parents’ complicated past, has learned forgiveness. Max, although he has been wronged, also values forgiveness. It is Gail, the character who has committed the ethical misstep, who is unable to forgive. None of these characters’ attitudes toward guilt and forgiveness would be as apparent without the problem that the possibility of Kenneth’s cheating poses. Thus, he plays an important role in helping the author explore other characters’ ethics and motivations, including in the past.

Joyce is Gail’s mother. She is a secondary character who does not play a large role in the novel’s action. However, she remains important for the way that she helps the author explore the impact that The Nuances of Aging and life transitions have on familial relationships. Joyce is characterized in part by her marriage to Gail’s father and how she navigated his end-of-life care. Gail recalls being blindsided by her father’s death even though it came at the end of a protracted illness. Joyce, on the other hand, took the loss in stride. She had cared for her husband during his final months, and for her, his death also marked the end of his suffering and her role as a caretaker. She could remain circumspect because she saw the loss of her husband from more angles than her daughter did. 

Joyce is also characterized by her lively personality. Although Gail bristles at the idea that others perceive her as tactless, she is judgmental and expresses herself with acerbity. She inherited these qualities from her mother: Joyce has quite a lot to say about Kenneth’s family and enjoys gossiping with Gail and Max in a manner that, although not mean-spirited, is critical. Joyce is also characterized by her age. Gail, now that she is in her sixties, has become aware of her age more acutely. This, in turn, has led her to see her mother in a new light: She realizes that although her mother is healthy, she is nearing the end of her life. Joyce has lost weight and height and looks “shrunken” in her wedding outfit. Gail observes that the hat and fancy clothes somehow emphasize Joyce’s old age, and observing her mother at the ceremony makes her feel wistful. Their relationship has changed as a result of both of them entering new stages of life: While Joyce’s grounded nature helped them navigate Gail’s father’s death, it is now Gail who is the caretaker in the relationship.

Sophie, Rupert, and Elizabeth are Kenneth’s parents and sister. Sophie and Rupert are stylish, and their clothing choices, to Gail, emphasize their affluence. Sophie pays much more attention to her appearance than Gail does and sponsors a day of beauty and pampering for Debbie right before her wedding. They belong to an opulent club, and their lifestyle contrasts markedly with the modest lives that Gail and Max, both educators, have led. Gail characterizes Sophie as someone who is “a lot” to interact with not only because she is uncomfortable with her easy extraversion but also because Sophie gradually takes over the wedding planning, producing a much more over-the-top affair than Debbie and Kenneth originally planned. She is frustrated with many of the wedding’s small details, and it is evident that, despite her interventions, she still would have designed a much different ceremony, dinner, and party. 

Elizabeth is an important character, although she does not receive much depth or detail within the novel: Elizabeth asserts that her brother cheated and nearly upends the wedding, but her motives are never fully explained. If, as Max and Gail suspect, Kenneth did cheat on Debbie and Debbie chose to forgive him, then it is possible that she was doing Debbie a service. However, because of the obvious antipathy between Elizabeth and Kenneth, it is also entirely possible that her decision to reveal Kenneth’s bad behavior was rooted in sibling rivalry rather than true concern for Debbie.