Penelope Keeling

The main character of the novel, Penelope Keeling has just recently suffered a heart attack. The novel opens as the independent, strong woman checks herself out of the hospital and returns back to her home at Podmore's Thatch. She is elated to be returning home, although she realizes that her children will most likely make a fuss about her early release. Penelope has three children—Nancy, Noel and Olivia—by her husband, Ambrose Keeling. She met and married Ambrose during the war. He was the first man that she had ever had a relationship with and became pregnant by him. Despite a warning from her mother to only marry Ambrose if she loved him, she made the mistake of getting married to him only to find out soon after that they were an utterly imperfect pairing.

Penelope is an open-minded, independent and strong woman who...