Chapter summaries Don't Let Him In Lisa Jewell

Chapter Two: A Family in the Aftermath

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Summary

After Paddy Swann’s funeral, his daughter Ash accepts a delivery of condolence flowers from the unknown Tanners. She carries them to the kitchen where her mother Nina, brother Arlo, grandmother, uncle, aunt, cousins, and best friend Ella sit around a wine-stained table littered with the remains of canapés. The atmosphere is brittle yet unburdened now that the formal day is over. Ash hands the card to her mother, who dismisses the sender; Ash stuffs the bouquet into an already occupied vase. Ella pours white wine for Ash.

Ash reflects on her father’s obsession with sunshine—he chased it around the garden and the world, installed a UV lamp for gray days, and named a sheltered sunny spot “Ibiza.” On the day they buried him, however, no sun appeared. She tells herself maybe he took it with him, although she firmly believes the dead hold no sway. Paddy was fifty-four, killed two weeks earlier when a stranger called Joe Kritner pushed him drunk onto the tube tracks after a friend’s restaurant opening in Soho. Ash and Arlo had assembled a photo album for the wake; leafing through it, Ash finds a picture of a twenty-five-year-old Paddy at Glastonbury, bucket hat and sunglasses, beer in hand. Her mother laughs, remembering the festival, the bands, and Paddy’s inevitable excess.

The family fills the room with loud talk, but the noise is laced with the painful absence of Paddy’s voice and laugh. Ash slams the album shut, gulps back the cloying wine, and wonders how any of them will go to bed and let this day end.

Key Events

  • Ash receives a flower delivery from the unknown Tanners and brings it to the kitchen.
  • She reads the card for her mother; Nina has no idea who they are.
  • Ash reuses a vase, jamming the new bouquet in with an older one.
  • Ella pours wine for Ash, signaling the shift from funeral to wake.
  • Ash describes Paddy’s sun-chasing rituals and notes the sun’s absence all day.
  • The circumstances of Paddy’s death are revealed: Joe Kritner pushed him under a train while he was drunk.
  • Ash and her brother created a photo album; she looks at a 1990s festival picture.
  • Nina, Arlo, and Ash briefly recall the Glastonbury trip and Paddy’s partying.
  • The family’s forced loudness highlights the void left by Paddy.
  • Ash slams the album shut and ponders how to move forward after the day ends.

Character Development

  • Ash: Pragmatic and emotionally weary, she manages the flower ritual with irritation, seeks solace in wine, and balances fond memories with an unsentimental view of death (“she very much believes that dead people have no influence”). Her internal monologue reveals raw grief and a dread of the first night without the funeral’s structure.
  • Nina (Mother): Her ragged voice and weary sighs suggest deep exhaustion. She delegates the flower task and refuses to dwell on the unknown senders, clinging to momentum.
  • Arlo: Brief interjection (“Drunk?”) shows a shared family understanding of Paddy’s habits and a dark humor that suffuses the wake.
  • Paddy Swann: Posthumously constructed as an uncomplicated hedonist who loved sun, music, festivals, drink, and drugs. His larger-than-life presence is felt precisely through its absence.
  • Joe Kritner: Mentioned only as the “very complicated person” who used Paddy as a character in his own internal story, his name introduced starkly alongside the violence.

Themes, Symbols, or Motifs Actually Evidenced Here

  • Sunshine as Life Force: Paddy’s relentless pursuit of sun—tracking forecasts, the UV lamp, the “Ibiza” spot—turns sunlight into a symbol of his vitality. Its total absence on the funeral day externalises the family’s emotional darkness; Ash’s fleeting thought that “maybe he’d taken it for himself” acknowledges the void but is swiftly countered by her rational disbelief in the afterlife.
  • The Unknowable Stranger: The flowers from the Tanners, whom no one can place, mirror the randomness of the killing. Just as a stranger sent condolences, another stranger ended Paddy’s life, underlining how impersonal violence fractured a close, uncomplicated family.
  • Loudness and Silence: The family fills the room with noise, but the narrator notes it is “riven through with something piquant and terrible.” The lack of Paddy’s voice becomes a forceful presence, making the chatter feel like a desperate attempt to hold off the inevitable quiet.
  • Memory and Ritual: The photo album serves as a tangible link to the past, while the messy table, mismatched flowers, and leftover canapés show the exhaustion of official mourning. Ash’s act of slamming the album captures the tension between honoring memory and the need to stop feeling.

Why This Chapter Matters

This chapter lands the reader inside the grieving family immediately after the funeral, anchoring the novel’s emotional stakes. It contrasts the vibrant, sun-drenched portrait of Paddy with the clinical facts of his random death, deepening the central tragedy. By exposing the raw mechanics of a wake—the clutter, the unknown senders, the forced festivity—it makes absence palpable. Ash’s collision of memory and bleak pragmatism establishes her as the lens through which the family’s story will unfold, and the unspoken question of how they will continue sets up the novel’s forward momentum.

Study Questions and Answers

1. How does the chapter contrast Paddy Swann’s personality with the circumstances of his death? Answer: Paddy is described as the “most uncomplicated human being in the world,” who lived for sunshine, music, and social pleasure. His death, however, was caused by a “very complicated person” who turned him into a character in a private narrative. This stark opposition underlines the senselessness of the violence and the way a mundane act—walking home drunk—can collide with another’s pathology.

2. What function do the flowers and the unknown Tanners serve in the scene? Answer: The delivery from the Tanners, whom nobody can identify, underscores the impersonal, almost bureaucratic side of condolence. Ash’s frustrated decision to crowd the flowers into a used vase mirrors the family’s saturation with grief trappings and their desire to move beyond ritual. The anonymous sympathy reflects the random, disconnected nature of the tragedy itself.

3. Why is the absent sun symbolically important on the day of the funeral? Answer: Paddy’s identity was bound to sunlight, so its disappearance on the day he is buried acts as an external marker of loss. Ash briefly imagines he took the sun with him, a fleeting, almost whimsical comfort, but she immediately pushes the thought away, reinforcing her rational, no-afterlife stance. The gray day thus becomes a canvas for both longing and the stark reality of permanent absence.

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