106-7). What follows is deeply tragic as Robbie is sent to prison and two people in love are separated forever.
Years later, Broiny realizes that she had made a terrible mistake and wants to atone for it. Hence the title of the novel-however this atonement, we realize is meaningless because it is completely fictional. Being a writer, Broiny writes the story of her sister, Robbie, and her own grand error. But instead of presenting the story as it was, she manipulates the ending and unites the two lovers. This was her way of atoning for her mistake-even though we know it was only on the paper. Broiny doesn't appear to be in as much pain as she should have been. She doesn't seem to care much about the facts as she writes: "If I really cared so much about facts, I should have written a different kind of book" (p. 360) But she does suffer from immense guilt and sees nursing as her way of making up for destroying two people and what could have been a happy future. However Broiny's brand of guilt is meaningless, shallow and even arrogant because of the fact that she is a writer. Her writing skills make her believe that she can do anything with anyone's lives. Even she herself understands that her atonement attempt is a sham for a person with power...
"I know there's always a certain kind of reader who will be compelled to ask, But what really happened?...The problem...has been this: how can a novelist achieve atonement when, with her absolute power of deciding outcomes, she is also God?" (p. 371)'
When it comes to passing ethical judgment, I feel that Broiny should have suffered more. Her youth or her inability to be wise should not be used as an excuse to exonerate her of all guilt. She should be seen a person who was responsible for separating two people deeply in love and her ability to fictionally unite them doesn't compensate the 'crime' she had committed. It is not even redemption in the real sense since two people were actually destroyed and it is not something that happened in her make-belief world.
Broiny is a writer and this is what gives her God-like powers. She appears less human than her sister or the victim, Robbie. A reader is compelled to decide against Broiny partly because her arrogance and lack of wisdom created trouble for two people and secondly because even after she is fully capable of understanding the magnitude of her colossal error, she does nothing but unites the lovers fictionally to satisfy her cruel soul.
