Louisa Jardine is the older one, the conscientious student, precise and careful: the one who years for a good marriage, an artistic career, a family. Clem, the archetypal youngest, is the rebel: uncontainable, iconoclastic, committed to her work but not to the men who fall for her daring nature. Louisa resents that the charismatic Clem has always been the favorite; yet as Clem puts it, "On the other side of the fence–mine–every expectation you fulfill . . . puts you one stop closer to that Grand Canyon rim from which you could one day rule the world–or plummet in very grand style."