Beatrice Shoemaker in That Summer: The Rebellious Daughter Who Sparks Her Mother's Awakening

Overview

Beatrice "Bea" Shoemaker is the teenage daughter of Daisy and Hal Shoemaker in Jennifer Weiner's That Summer. She enters the story mid-crisis: expelled from the elite Emlen Academy for spray-painting "RAPIST" on a male classmate's door, she becomes the catalyst that forces her mother to confront the truth about her marriage and her husband's past. The novel's reading group guide explicitly invites readers to notice that Beatrice is almost the same age Diana Starling was when Hal—then known as Poe—assaulted her, a parallel that gives Beatrice's rebellion a weight beyond ordinary teenage defiance.

Beatrice is defined by her refusal to perform the role assigned to her. She dresses in vintage Laura Ashley dresses and silver-lavender hair, pursues crafts over college credentials, and questions whether any place is truly safe for girls and women. Her rebellion is both aesthetic and moral, and it quietly reshapes everyone around her.

Plot Role: The Catalyst

Beatrice's expulsion opens the novel's present-day timeline. The dean's call about the spray-painted door is what Daisy is lying awake about in Chapter 1, and it sends Hal and Daisy driving to New Hampshire. Beatrice's act—and her unapologetic defense of it—is the first crack in the Shoemakers' carefully managed domestic surface.

But Beatrice's role extends beyond the inciting incident. Her transfer to Melville brings her into the orbit of Doff Cartwright, whose in-class search for emergency contraception prompts Beatrice's reflection on consent and on the fate of girls like Tricia at Emlen. Her free-writing exercise about Drue Cavanaugh's murder connects the novel's Cape Cod setting to its themes of danger and safety for women. And her friendship with Diana—whom she bonds with over vintage clothes, decoupage, and taxidermy—helps draw Daisy into the relationship that will ultimately expose Hal.

In the coda, Beatrice is the one who has landed most securely: paddleboarding across Cape Cod Bay, attending public high school in Orleans, learning crafts from Diana, and declining a young man's invitation with easy confidence. Her arc from expelled rebel to settled young woman mirrors the novel's larger movement from secrecy to truth.

Motivations and Traits

Beatrice's primary motivation is authenticity. She hates Emlen's achievement culture—"all the kids bragged about how little sleep they'd gotten and how much coffee they'd consumed"—and refuses to compete for the credentials her father values. She wants to do crafts: knitting, needle-felting, embroidery, and crochet. When she discovers wire sculpture in sixth grade, she feels "a magical click in her brain," the sense that this, not law or medicine, is what she was made for.

Her clothing is a deliberate statement. She dresses "to please herself, and to feel comfortable," and she is explicit about the political dimension: if the boys at Melville believe her body is an object for their pleasure, she'd be happy to tell them otherwise. This is not passive rebellion; it is a conscious refusal of the male gaze and the social norms that police girls' appearance.

Beatrice is also observant and morally clear-eyed. She remembers Colin Mackenzie at Emlen putting his arm around Tricia, and knowing that nothing would happen to Colin while Tricia, on scholarship, would be sent home. She recognizes the "Lucky Sperm Club" of privileged boys who inherit their advantages. She notices her father's control over the family—the way he decides vacations, schools, and where they live—and her reading of A Doll's House at Emlen sharpens her perception of her parents' dynamic.

Her humor is dry and self-aware. She jokes with Doff about "Philip K. Dick" and describes her mother's gray fleece overalls as something she'd die of shame to see in public. But her wit never undercuts her seriousness about the things that matter: consent, safety, and the futures available to girls.

Chronological Arc

Beatrice's arc spans roughly a year and a half, from her expulsion in March 2019 to the coda's hot August afternoon.

Before the novel opens: Beatrice attends Emlen Academy, where she feels out of place and academically below average. She endures the school's culture of anxiety and achievement, and she witnesses the Colin Mackenzie incident—a boy who touches a girl and faces no consequences while the girl is blamed.

Chapter 2 (Melville): Beatrice transfers to Melville after her expulsion. In American Literature class, she notices Doff searching for emergency contraception and recalls her mother's awkward sex talk. Her free-writing exercise about Drue Cavanaugh's murder reveals her preoccupation with the Cape Cod killing and her growing conviction that "there are no truly safe places for girls and women."

Chapter 13: Beatrice considers a flirtation with Cade, a popular jock, weighing the social capital of a boyfriend against her genuine uncertainty about whether she even likes him. She recognizes the "born-on-third-base" privilege he represents but also glimpses something that isn't detestable in him.

Chapter 25: At a family dinner party, Beatrice bonds with Diana over vintage clothes and crafts. She observes her father's discomfort with Diana and her mother's small acts of resistance, like the loud "Get a pizza!" that Beatrice overhears from another room.

Chapter 34: Beatrice is at Vernon's house when Daisy confronts Hal at Diana's cottage. Her absence from the climactic scene means she learns of the separation afterward, through her parents' changed arrangements.

Coda: Beatrice paddleboards across Cape Cod Bay. Her father has given her and her mother his father's house for the summer and beyond. She attends public high school in Orleans, learns crafts from Diana, and receives surf-casting lessons from Diana's husband. When a young man paddles up and invites her to hang out, she declines "for now" and paddles away—a small assertion of her own timing and agency. For more on how her story resolves, see the ending explained.

Relationships

With Daisy: Beatrice's relationship with her mother is affectionate but strained. Daisy's sex talk is a source of cringe; Daisy's attempts to prove how well she knows her daughter often land as interruptions. Yet Beatrice notices her mother's unhappiness—"the frown that seemed to have established permanent residence on her mother's face"—and her mother's small rebellions. In the coda, the two have settled into a new equilibrium: Daisy cooks at The Abbey, and Beatrice has space to become herself.

With Hal: Beatrice's relationship with her father is defined by his control and her resistance. He dictates her school, her college path, and even her outfits at family events ("You can express yourself three hundred and sixty days of the year, but for five days I get to pick"). His saying "He who pays the piper calls the tune" encapsulates his worldview. Beatrice's spray-painting of "RAPIST" on a classmate's door is, in part, a rebellion against this paternal authority—and it becomes tragically ironic when the reader learns what Hal himself did.

With Diana: Diana is the adult who sees Beatrice clearly. She compliments Beatrice's hat and pin sincerely, asks about her crafts without pivoting to college talk, and shares her own decoupage and embroidery. Their bond is one of the novel's examples of female friendship crossing generations, and it connects to the theme of female friendship as a source of strength and transformation.

With Doff: Doff is Beatrice's ally at Melville, sharing her irreverent humor and her skepticism about boys like Cade. Their banter—"What about his Philip K. Dick?"—shows Beatrice finding a peer who gets her.

With Cade: Beatrice's brief flirtation with Cade is ambivalent. She recognizes his privilege and entitlement, but she also glimpses something human in him. The reading group guide asks whether this flirtation proves that the world Diana describes—where being female means living as prey—still holds true, or whether it reflects a generational difference.

Key Decisions and Consequences

Spray-painting "RAPIST" on a classmate's door: This is Beatrice's defining act. It gets her expelled from Emlen, angers her father, and sets the novel's plot in motion. The novel never fully details the incident, but Beatrice defends her actions by saying her roommate "followed procedures," implying a formal complaint process was ignored. The act is both reckless and principled, and it aligns with the novel's exploration of bystander complicity and the culture of silence.

Transferring to Melville: The move places Beatrice in a less prestigious school, which her father resents but which allows her to find Doff and to write the free-writing piece that reveals her inner life.

Choosing crafts over credentials: Beatrice's insistence on art over a liberal arts degree is a quiet rebellion against her father's plans. By the coda, her craft practice has become a source of connection with Diana and a marker of her chosen path.

Declining the young man's invitation in the coda: This small decision signals Beatrice's newfound agency. She is not rejecting connection; she is choosing her own timing.

Themes and Symbols

Beatrice embodies several of the novel's central themes. Her story connects to healing from sexual trauma as a nonlinear, lifelong process through the parallel between her age and Diana's age at the time of the assault—a parallel the reading group guide highlights. Her rebellion against her father's control and her refusal to accept the "Lucky Sperm Club" connect to class privilege, social mobility, and the performance of identity. And her spray-painting act—along with the novel's questions about who is held responsible—connects to the moral complexity of revenge and the search for accountability.

Beatrice's crafts are a symbol of her refusal to perform. Her shadowboxes, taxidermy, and needle-felting are tangible, handmade things in a world of resumes and credentials. Her vintage clothing is a costume of her own choosing, in contrast to the "drag" Diana describes wearing for her executive role. Where other characters perform identity, Beatrice insists on making hers.

The Drue Cavanaugh murder haunts Beatrice throughout the novel. She writes about it in her free-writing exercise, reflecting that she and Drue "probably looked up at the same stars from the same spot on the beach." Drue's death—and the gap between her curated online life and her real one—teaches Beatrice that appearances can lie, a lesson that resonates with the novel's larger revelations about Hal.

Discussion Questions

1. Why does Beatrice spray-paint "RAPIST" on a classmate's door, and what does the novel suggest about her motives?

The novel never fully details the incident, but Beatrice defends her actions by saying her roommate "followed procedures," implying that a formal complaint was ignored. Her earlier memory of Colin Mackenzie—a boy who touched a girl and faced no consequences while the girl was blamed—suggests she acted out of frustration with a system that protects privileged boys. The act is reckless, but the novel frames it as a principled refusal of silence.

2. How does Beatrice's relationship with her father shape her rebellion?

Hal controls Beatrice's school, her college path, and even her clothes at family events. His motto—"He who pays the piper calls the tune"—reduces her to a dependent whose choices are not her own. Beatrice's rebellion is partly against this paternal authority, and the irony is that Hal himself is guilty of the very crime Beatrice protested against.

3. What role does Beatrice play in Daisy's awakening?

Beatrice's expulsion forces Daisy to confront her husband's anger and her own complicity. Beatrice's unhappiness—the frown on Daisy's face that Beatrice notices—and her mother's small acts of resistance suggest that Beatrice's rebellion gives Daisy permission to question her own marriage. In the coda, Daisy has left Hal and built a new life, and Beatrice's settled presence is part of that transformation.

4. How does Beatrice's friendship with Diana differ from her relationship with her mother?

Diana sees Beatrice clearly—complimenting her hat and pin, asking about her crafts without pivoting to college talk, sharing her own decoupage and embroidery. Daisy, by contrast, interrupts and performs her knowledge of her daughter. Diana offers Beatrice a model of a woman who lives on her own terms, and their bond crosses generations in a way Daisy and Beatrice's strained intimacy cannot.

5. What does Beatrice's final scene—declining the young man's invitation—reveal about her arc?

In the coda, Beatrice paddleboards across Cape Cod Bay, has settled into public high school, and has learned crafts from Diana. When a young man invites her to hang out, she declines "for now" and paddles away. This small act of choosing her own timing signals that Beatrice has moved from rebellion to agency—she is no longer reacting against her father's control, but living her own life on her own terms. For more discussion, see the questions and answers.