Hello Beautiful

“The idea of love in those books—Wuthering Heights, Jane Eyre, Anna Karenina—is that it’s a force that obliterates you. They’re all tragedies, Sylvie. Think about it; those novels all end with despair, or death.”

While Julia pursues traditional notions of success—a degree, marriage, a career—Sylvie dreams of a great romantic love like the ones represented in her favorite novels. However, Julia cautions her that all these novels end in tragedy, foreshadowing both the great romance and tragedy that will befall Sylvie later in life.

“In the heat of the news the day before, she hadn’t considered that Cecelia was repeating their mother’s history. Rose had gotten pregnant with Julia when she was nineteen and unmarried, and Rose’s mother had stopped speaking to her.”

Cecelia's pregnancy and her mother's reaction to it mirror what happened with Rose and her mother. Despite the difference in time period, having a child out of wedlock is still seen by the older Catholic women as a sin. This highlights the idea that children can repeat their parents’ mistakes without realizing it and that one shouldn’t follow traditions blindly.

“When any of his girls—including Rose—had come into view, he’d always given them the same welcome, calling out, Hello beautiful!”

Charlie’s special greeting highlights his close bond with his daughters and the way he celebrates each of their unique skills and strengths. He refers to Julia as his rocket, tells Sylvie she reminds him of himself, calls Emeline his baby, etc., but he showers each of them with abundant love. After his death, the girls remember and talk about Charlie, and William reflects that this keeps him alive and part of their family. As the title of the novel, “Hello beautiful!” is more than a greeting: It’s a way of seeing the world that Charlie exemplifies.

“She and her brother-in-law were both struggling to inhabit their own skin, a goal that would sound absurd to almost anyone else.”

After Charlie’s death and Rose’s departure, Sylvie feels unmoored and unsure of who she is anymore. However, she feels a special bond with William after she reads his manuscript. She recognizes that William has the same questions and feels drawn to him because of it.

“Now William could see pain as if it were a dark cloud chasing each of the players across the court. They were outrunning it, for now. William had outrun it for a time too.”

The pain that William experienced—both emotionally and physically—allows him to better see and recognize pain in others. After his suicide attempt and subsequent hospitalization, William uses his understanding of pain to help other basketball players prevent injuries. Through his character arc, William is able to turn his vulnerabilities into strengths.

“It felt meaningful too that his own pretend teaching career and his life with Julia had expired with the ancient professor.”

The death of his first history teacher is the catalyst for William’s reckoning with his true desires. Because William met Julia in the professor’s class, his death symbolizes the futility of William trying to be someone he is not.

“William’s brain clung to a new refrain, after the weeks in the hospital: No bullshit and no secrets.”

This quote highlights the theme of authenticity in Hello Beautiful. The novel explores the idea that living a genuine life, free of deceit and pretense, is essential for personal fulfillment. William's realization that he needs to live without lies or secrets is a key moment in the novel, as it marks the beginning of his journey toward authenticity and allows him to live a richer and more meaningful life.

“William was her one. He was her heart. He had changed all the molecules inside her. Sylvie had known love would come for her with the force of a tsunami. She’d dreamed of this ever since she was a little girl, and her dream had actually come true.”

When Sylvie first dreams of having a great love affair, her only reference points are the relationships she has seen in novels. Her parents’ marriage is unhappy, and she knows no real-life examples of a great love. Because of this, she thinks she will be safe from this dream ever coming to fruition. However, when she begins her relationship with William, this safe world is upended, as she realizes that she loves him and must face the consequences of that love.

“Her sisters had always been her best friends; in Chicago, there had never been a need for anyone else in her life. She and Sylvie and the twins knew every version, every age, every mood of one another; Julia couldn’t comprehend how to form an intimate friendship with a stranger.”

After Julia relocates to New York City, she is living her dream: She experiences success and advancement in her career, feels empowered by motherhood, and enjoys the bustle of the city. However, she still struggles to make friends. Because her bonds with her sisters are so intimate and strong, she knows that no other friendship will ever be comparable.

“Julia thought about her sister as naturally as she thought about herself: Sylvie was part of Julia.”

Julia sees Sylvie as an extension of herself, as if their identities are intertwined. By viewing Sylvie as an integral part of herself, Julia reveals a deep sense of closeness with her sister. This suggests that Julia will struggle to define herself as an individual.

“Toward the end of the meal, Cecelia stood and toasted: ‘To love.’ Everyone up and down the table said and felt the words—the beauty, and the cost, of love.”

The phrase "the beauty, and the cost, of love" reinforces the idea that love is not always easy. It can be beautiful, but it can also be painful and challenging. The word "cost" suggests that with love, something must be given away or sacrificed. Sylvie embraces the cost of her love for William, which is losing her connection to Julia and Alice. William is at first afraid of the cost of loving his daughter, fearing he will negatively impact her, but gradually comes to understand that there is also a cost to his absence.

“She didn’t like to inconvenience her mother; Alice prided herself on not causing Julia difficulties. She got good report cards and often signed her own permission slips for field trips so Julia would have one less thing to do.”

Alice takes pride in trying to be as self-sufficient as possible, a quality she inherited from Julia. Despite Alice’s desire to know the truth about her father, she is afraid of losing the only family member she has—her mother. As a result, she becomes cautious, living life without any risks and keeping herself safe but closing herself off to love in the process.

“Alice pictured her mother on one small deserted island and herself on a different island, within waving distance.”

Alice's image of herself and her mother on separate islands highlights the emotional distance between them. The fact that the islands are within waving distance suggests that they are not completely separated, but rather emotionally and psychologically distant. Alice's isolation shows the negative impact of Julia’s deception.

“Sylvie carried Julia with her, but she ached for the baby girl who had left the family with her mother.”

Although Sylvie still feels connected to Julia through their sibling bond, she does not share that bond with Alice and grieves Alice’s absence in her life. Because of her unconditional love and acceptance of William, Sylvie does not push him to reconcile though she holds out hope that he eventually will do so on his own terms.

“When Sylvie spoke their family history into the air, all she heard was love.”

Sylvie chooses to view her family history through a lens of love and acceptance, rather than focusing on the painful moments and hardships they faced. Instead of dwelling on her mother's abandonment of the family or Julia’s absence in their lives, Sylvie cherishes the love that has always been present between her and her siblings. By choosing to focus on the positive aspects of her family history, Sylvie is able to find clarity and purpose in the midst of difficult circumstances.

“Whenever Sylvie felt a quiver of fear, she repeated to herself the line: And to die is different from what any one supposed, and luckier.”

Sylvie uses this line from Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass to help her deal with her anxieties around dying. The line is a reminder that death is a natural part of life and that it may not be as terrible as we often imagine. By repeating this line, Sylvie lets go of some of her worries about the future. The line also helps her feel connected to her father, who passed away decades earlier.

“He was no better than his mom and dad, really. All three of them had lost time and love with people who deserved both.”

When William finally begins to confront the great loss in his childhood, he realizes that he closed himself off to Alice the same way his parents closed themselves off to him. This highlights the theme of how children can grow up to repeat their parents’ mistakes. However, through facing his past, William is able to see the truth and begin the inner work of preparing for reconciliation.

“Charlie had been deemed a failure in his lifetime, but almost thirty years after his death, his daughters’ love for him ran so deep that he could be considered the most successful person William had ever known. People still came up to Sylvie in the library, after all this time, to tell her about a kind thing her father had done for them.”

One of the central ideas of the novel is that success can be measured by more than just material possessions and societal status. The quote reveals that William recognizes Charlie’s success at being a compassionate person, which implies that William values this and will strive to be compassionate in his own life.

“She was Julia’s wild hair, she was the lake her husband had once been carried out of, and no matter what happened next, she was love.”

By identifying herself as these things, Sylvie acknowledges the impact they had on her life and how they have shaped her into the person she is. Love is an integral part of who Sylvie is, and this reinforces the idea that love is a powerful force that can shape people’s identities.

“They’d fixed what had been broken between them, which meant his wife had found wholeness. Sylvie had gotten what she needed, and this made it possible for him to take another breath.”

Because Julia and Sylvie kept it a secret from everyone, William has no idea that they reconciled before Sylvie’s death. Thus, he is relieved when he learns the truth; their reconciliation brings him closure because he feels partially to blame for the sisters’ long alienation.

“It was true, as Alice had long suspected, that when she’d looked in the mirror, her father had been looking back.”

In many ways, Alice is a mirror of William. She inherits his height as well as his existential questioning, though without his presence in her life, she has no way of confirming this. When Alice sees her father for the first time, she knows for certain that she resembles him, and this allows her to feel a sense of belonging.

“She was painted into this family, mirrored in her father’s face. She was more abundant than she’d believed possible.”

Alice sees portraits of herself painted by Cecelia on the walls of the Padavanos’ home; she also sees her resemblance to William. For her entire childhood, Alice felt that having one parent was not enough and worried about what would happen if her mother died. At the end of the novel, she learns that she is rich with family.

“It occurred to Alice that she had left home to see her father, and Sylvie had left her home—her life—which opened the possibility of a reunion with her own.”

On the same day that Alice arrives in Chicago, Sylvie dies. Previously, Sylvie wondered what “one-two punch” her death would bring since major life events in their family seem to arrive in pairs. Alice also recognizes the connection between the two events, thinking of how both she and Sylvie are reuniting with their fathers. The parallels and patterns between major life events are another theme explored in Hello Beautiful.