Run, Rose, Run

“She’d been writing songs ever since she could talk and making melodies even before that. AnnieLee Keyes couldn’t hear the call of a wood thrush, the plink plink plink of a leaky faucet, or the rumbling rhythm of a freight train without turning it into a tune. Crazy girl finds music in everything—that’s what her mother had said, right up until the day she died.”

This excerpt establishes AnnieLee as a natural musician, who finds music in everyday things long before she has had access to a traditional instrument. The use of onomatopoeia in the “plink plink plink” description of the dripping faucet creates a vivid picture of a young AnnieLee being enchanted by her everyday sonic landscape. The memory of her mother’s view that AnnieLee found music in everything contributes to AnnieLee’s view of herself as a musician and establishes the sense that she was born for a life in music, without recourse to training.

“Ruthanna didn’t want to put on high heels, false eyelashes, and a sparkling Southern smile anymore. She wasn’t going to stand up on some hot, bright stage in a dress so tight it made her ribs ache. She had no desire to pour her heart out into a melody that’d bring tears to a thousand pairs of eyes, hers included.”

Ruthanna’s rejection of performing is revealed in her refusing a catalog of uncomfortable visual requirements of performance—namely, heels that hurt, heavy lashes, a false smile, and the visceral image of a painfully clinging dress. The physical pain of the outfit then leads to the bittersweet emotional pain of melodies that moved her as much as the audience. The fact that Ruthanna continues to be moved by the music establishes the book’s argument that the music is the most important and enduring aspect of country performance.

“She might break a law or two, or fail to answer certain pointed questions, but she always told the truth unless she absolutely couldn’t. Her stepdad had been a cheat and a liar, and she never wanted to be anything like him.”

This conveys AnnieLee’s equivocal relationship with the truth. On one hand, she despises lies, associating them with a man she wants to be the opposite from. On the other hand, however, she experiences situations when she can’t tell the truth. Here, the use of the superlatives “absolutely” and “never” implies that AnnieLee must be running from and covering up something desperate to be going against a value she holds dear.

“The smell of the Cat’s Paw—the funk of old beer, fryer grease, and Bar Keepers Friend—worked like a time machine, and for an instant Ruthanna was her younger self again, cocky and scared at the same time, aching to take Nashville by storm.”

The association of the Cat’s Paw with the sense of smell, one of the more bodily animal senses, and Ruthanna’s transportation by the references to fryer grease and beer indicate that the bar is an authentic, homegrown country music spot as opposed to the more sanitized aspects of the corporate music world. The impact of the place is so contagious that it takes Ruthanna back to when she was a hungry young artist like AnnieLee. Arguably, the setting aids Ruthanna’s empathy with the girl.

“Where did this girl come from? AnnieLee Keyes looked barely older than a teenager, but she sang as though she’d lived for ninety-nine years and seen tragedy in each one of them.”

The contrast of AnnieLee’s youthful appearance and the worldly wisdom of her songwriting paints her as a fascinating enigma. Ruthanna’s question at the beginning of the passage conveys the unlikely phenomenon of a teenager living long enough to sing in 99 tragic years.

“We had a poster of you in the kitchen, right next to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and I thought you were one of the saints! I figured you had to be, to sing like that. I even prayed to you.”

Normally curt, AnnieLee’s rapture at seeing Ruthanna is evident in this happy childhood memory. The young AnnieLee’s placement of Ruthanna’s picture with the saints in this poor rural home indicates the importance of country music in the lives of deprived people. Moreover, AnnieLee’s mistaking Ruthanna for a saint—and addressing her as one in her prayers—indicates that music is sacred to her.

“It’s a hard, rough business […] You’ll get chewed up and spit out like a hunk of gristle. Sure, you might taste success, but you’re more likely to end up broke and alone.”

Ruthanna admonishes AnnieLee’s wish to become a country superstar in a grim warning of what awaits her if she pursues her dream. The metaphorical physical violence and digestion imagery of being “chewed up” and “spit out” indicates the predatory nature of an industry that sees women artists as superfluous and interchangeable. Similarly, the threat of ending up “broke,” a slang word for poor, alludes to the near-physical pain of a failed career in country music, in which one is “broken.” However, Ruthanna’s hyperbole of doom is a front for her own real pain concerning her daughter Sophia’s fate.

“I didn’t get where I am alone […] a lot of people helped me along the way. Some of them did it because they loved me, and some did it because they knew they’d make money from me.”

The message that no star makes it alone is important for AnnieLee, who—given her past experiences—struggles to trust people. Ruthanna implies that AnnieLee should be on her guard to distinguish between those who care for her and those who want to profit from her.

“But you’ve got to nail down your story, AnnieLee. That’s what a good country son is: a story about real things and real people and real emotions, set to a really good tune.”

The repetition of “real” in Ruthanna’s definition of a good country song indicates the importance of a semblance of truth, even in the art of composition. Thus, while AnnieLee is determined to keep her origins vague, Ruthanna insists that good music has its basis in truth and precision.

“They’ll mold you into whatever they think the market wants and turn you into someone you don’t want to be. And you’ll be so seduced by their promises that you’ll let them.”

Ruthanna describes the common predicament befalling country stars who have not yet had enough time to develop their voice and vision. The image of one being molded indicates the homogenizing tendency of music executives, who tend to play it safe when guessing what the market wants. The notion that AnnieLee could turn into someone she might not like is a powerful deterrent for a person who values authenticity as much as AnnieLee does. However, the idea of being “seduced” by the executives’ promises anyway indicates that her inexperience could be a liability and warns her that she must be stand her ground.

“Every inch of her body ached, and the bruises she couldn’t see hurt worse than the bruises she could. Sometimes the deep ones took days to come to the surface.”

The image of bruises belying bruises indicates the severity of AnnieLee’s beating by her assailants. The casual observation that the deepest bruises took days to appear shows that AnnieLee is a seasoned recipient of beatings and that violence was a common occurrence in the past she’s running from. This builds suspense regarding what happened to her.

‘“Making it’ has different meanings for different people […] Honestly, I like being a studio musician. I want to write songs, and every once in a while, I want to perform them.”

Ethan’s comment that success means different things to different people indicates his innate wisdom and independence of thought. Rather than searching out the common, cookie-cutter definition of contemporary success, which is to be as famous as possible, Ethan wants to live and be known on his own terms. His grounding-over-glamor attitude proves a good influence on AnnieLee, as it dissuades her from seeking publicity for its own sake.

“Sophia was a banjo player […] she was very good and she could have been great. But hard work didn’t come to her naturally, not the way it came to me. Maybe because she was born having everything.”

Ruthanna establishes one of the novel’s core beliefs, that hard work is essential to making dreams come true and that it can wield one out of any sort of poverty. Sophia’s being born into privilege made it difficult for her to live this aspect of the American Dream and contributed to her downfall. Thus, although AnnieLee has suffered in coming from nothing, Ruthanna hints that being born having everything can be even more perilous.

“I won’t pretend to be a city sophisticate, Mr. Graham […] but you can stop talking to me like I’m as dumb as a turnip. I’m a straight talker, too, and I’m here to tell you that you’ve got a damn gold mine right here sitting across from you.”

AnnieLee’s extraordinary confidence manifests in this passage. She uses the rustic imagery of a turnip and a gold mine to contrast her perceived worth in the eyes of a city sophisticate with her real worth in her own eyes. Her eloquence proves that she’s more than capable of standing up for herself and doesn’t deserve to be talked to patronizingly.

“Just think hard about who you are […] and who you want to be. The truth—whatever that may look like—doesn’t really matter. There’s only what you tell us, and what you’ll have us believe.”

Publicist Eileen’s message about adopting a flexible attitude toward the truth is the one AnnieLee takes on board as she embarks on a journey of superstardom. The idea that the truth doesn’t really matter goes against AnnieLee’s core value of integrity, but it’s a useful one when she wants to carve out a future diametrically opposed to her past.

“She was humming the song she’d almost thrown away—the one about the girl who’d hated being ignored until she found out that being noticed was worse. I was invisible, invisible/ Like shade at midnight, a ghost in sunlight.”

AnnieLee’s secret song about wanting to be noticed and finding out that being noticed is far more dangerous than going unnoticed speaks to the undertone of sexual violence in her story. From being a young girl who was so under the radar that the simile of shade at midnight is apt to describe her, she became overly conspicuous.

“I carried that…stain. People didn’t look at me the same after that. And it just felt like my whole life was gone […] I guess because it was. Like it was blown up by a bomb.”

The metaphor of a stain symbolizes the acute feeling of shame that Ethan carries from being temporarily and wrongly convicted for his wife’s death. Although Ethan has been to war, the simile of a life being blown up by a bomb seems more apt here, because what happened with his wife was the most devastating thing he ever experienced.

“She was on the railing now, perched like a bird. It was time to fly. Either she’d know all kinds of answers soon—like if there was a heaven, and if her mother was waiting for her—or else she might know nothing ever again.”

AnnieLee fully prepares to die, as she prefers diving off the balcony to confronting her pursuer and chancing the possibility that he’ll be victorious. Her mood of exhilaration and bleakness transposes onto her alternate visions of the afterlife. On one hand, it could be a heaven where she rejoins her mother, while on the other it could be an abyss where all her potential goes to waste. The image of the bird links back to the initial image in the novel of flying being like falling.

“He found her bag and began to gather up what little clothing there was. And as he did, he asked himself, What sort of person packed a tiny duffel bag for a three-week road trip?”

Ethan’s discovery of the scarcity of AnnieLee’s luggage tells him more about her past than anything she has said. The process of gathering the clothing gives him time to stop and think about the reality before him. The rhetorical question is a prelude to the extremity of the answer, which is that AnnieLee is a person on the run.

“He wouldn’t understand. And if he knew the truth, he’d never look at her the same way again. It wasn’t the kind of thing a man could forget.”

AnnieLee’s idea that Ethan would never look at her the same way after discovering her secret indicates the extent of her shame. The notion that a man couldn’t forget the sort of secret she’s hiding indicates an aura of sexual shame about what she’s hiding. Thus, AnnieLee has absorbed some of the worthlessness her attackers attribute to her—a thought pattern common among survivors of abuse that combines with the fear of retribution to create a powerful deterrent to admitting the truth.

“Pretty soon it was just a dirt track, and it seemed like the trees were closing in on him from all sides. […] ‘You’re going to think that you’ve gone too far, and you’re lost,’ Blaine had said. ‘But you won’t be. You’re just supposed to feel like it.’”

The abundance of trees obscuring the path to the house AnnieLee grew up in indicates the extent to which her upbringing was secluded, cut off from the world. The shade from the trees creates a literal darkness that corresponds to the metaphorical darkness of her experiences. Blaine’s warning provides an enticing sense of hyperbole but also a clue that AnnieLee’s stepfather Clayton’s bark is worse than his bite and that the real villains are elsewhere.

“The chief grew up here, just like Clayton did. They rode their damn Schwinns around town when they were little, and they got drunk in the same Boone County bars when they grew up […] Which meant that when I called on Anderson, he took Clayton’s side.”

This is one of many passages that show how Caster County Arkansas is a place where men look out for each other and disregard the safety and interests of women. The repeated use of the collective pronoun ‘they’ alongside a trajectory of Clayton and Anderson growing up with each other and progressing from bikes to bars reinforces the idea of authorized patriarchal opposition to AnnieLee and the sense that she was on her own in defending herself.

“I was so broken. I knew that if I ran and he caught me, he’d kill me. But what was death compared to where I was? Death was a damn picnic.”

This passage echoes the idea that death is preferable to the life AnnieLee experienced with D. The ironic comparison of death to “a damn picnic” indicates that the trauma of her life with him was worse than the thought of ending life altogether. This aligns with her preferring to jump from a balcony rather than face him. Although AnnieLee felt broken by her life in D’s service, she had the intrinsic enough gumption to risk running and to believe in herself.