Summers at the Saint

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of rape, sexual harassment, child death, and death.

Traci is the chief protagonist of the novel and the main point-of-view character. She grew up in the town of Bonaventure, Georgia, in a family of low to middle economic status. When she was a child, the Saint seemed like a fairy-tale place to her. When she first saw inside the hotel, Traci was impressed by its luxury, but not the bratty behavior of the girl whose birthday party she was there to celebrate. For her, this highlighted the difference between the spoiled Saints and the beleaguered Ain’ts.

As a teenager, however, Traci’s work at the Saint gave her a deeper insight into the workings of the hotel and an understanding of the people who keep it running. The summer she was 19 and working as a lifeguard at the hotel pool, Traci met and married Hoke Eddings, the son of Fred and Helen Eddings, who owned the hotel. This turned Traci into a Saint, at least in the estimation of others, but she never developed a sense of entitlement or snobbery. Rather, Traci felt that she lost something in this transition: Shannon had been her best friend all throughout their childhood, but the summer of the drowning, Shannon was fired and never spoke to Traci again.