57 pages • 1 hour read
Daniel G. MillerThe Orphanage by the Lake
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2024A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Themes
Appearance Versus Reality
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of rape and emotional abuse.
In The Orphanage by the Lake, not everything is as it seems. Those who appear suspicious or strange are vindicated as uninvolved in the crime of Mia’s kidnapping, while others who seem kind and charitable are revealed to be the culprits. This dynamic characterizes the core theme of appearance versus reality. This theme highlights how even savvy individuals like Hazel Cho can be manipulated into trusting the wrong people.
Over the course of Hazel’s investigation into Mia’s disappearance, she develops suspicions into many characters based on her initial impressions of them and her interpretations of their behavior. For instance, she takes an instant dislike to the headmaster, Dr. Thomas Mackenzie, because of his odd, old-fashioned preferences in his running of Saint Agnes, his dour demeanor, and his impeding of the investigation into Mia’s disappearance by Hazel and the police. She persists in her suspicions of him even when those who know Dr. Mackenzie counsel her against this stance. When she presents her suspicions to Madeline, Madeline objects strongly, stating, “He’s done more for those little girls in a year than most of us will do in a lifetime” (111).
This sentiment is echoed by another missing girl’s cousin, Sarah, who tells Hazel that Dr. Mackenzie seemed to be the only one who showed concern. Hazel’s suspicions take on an even more ironic cast when she approaches Dr. Mackenzie’s house and thinks he looks like “just a nice grandpa relaxing after a hard day,” but thinks to herself “looks can be deceiving” (200). Ultimately, Dr. Mackenzie defies Hazel’s understanding of him and proves himself to be largely innocent of the scheme. Hazel is likewise wrong about Madeline, Neil Painter, Kenny, and Mr. Goolsbee.
This pattern is entirely inverted when it comes to Hazel’s assessment of Andrew DuPont. She does not suspect him at all, even when the evidence that he is involved in the kidnapping scheme is manifest. She is quite literally swept off her feet by him. When she first meets him, her “heart stops in [her] chest” and she is “so shocked by his appearance” that she can barely speak (138). She feels his “eyes are kind and genuine, unlike the cold arrogant eyes of other good-looking men I’ve known” (138). She is so smitten she overlooks objective evidence, such as the fact that Andrew’s family owns a house on the lake, and the warnings of both Kenny and Bobby, who tell her that powerful families like the DuPonts are likely involved in the scheme.
Andrew encourages her affections by acting like the perfect gentleman: Complimenting her looks, listening compassionately, and generally caring for her. It is not until the final scenes that she realizes who he really is despite appearances. A similar dynamic plays out in her manipulation by Sonia Barreto. In the end, Hazel is forced to reckon with how “easily [she] fell under Andrew’s sway” (286), reinforcing the idea that people are not always as they first appear to be.
Conforming to or Defying Parental Expectations
One of the core conflicts the primary characters in The Orphanage by the Lake face is how to handle familial expectations and values. Hazel and Kenny break from the expectations their family has for them to pursue their own paths, while Madeline and Andrew conform to their family’s expectations. Both ways of living have their own pitfalls, but ultimately the text suggests that conforming to parental expectations can be more harmful than defying them.
Both Kenny and Hazel come from conservative Korean American families who expect them to pursue white-collar professions. When they decide to pursue their own interests, it creates tension between themselves and their family. For instance, when Kenny decided to become a police officer, his wealthy family cut him off. When Hazel tells her mother she has a new case, instead of support, her mother acts as if it “is like a gambling addict saying [they] just won a bet” (43). These decisions create some difficulties in their lives: They do not have a lot of money and live together in a somewhat run-down apartment. Hazel struggles with feeling like a “disappointment” to her family. Despite these downsides, they are ultimately rewarded for their lack of conformity by being able to lead their lives as they wish.
One of the most powerful aspects of Hazel’s defiance of her family’s values can be found in the way she handles her rape and the subsequent trauma. For years afterward, she “blamed herself” for what happened, in conformity with her mother and sister’s assertions that she was somehow to blame for accepting a drink that had been drugged. Eventually, however, she broke with their victim-blaming paradigm and came to understand that she was the victim who did not deserve what happened to her. She channeled her desire for justice into a career helping others as a private investigator, demonstrating the power and self-actualization that comes from defying family expectations.
In contrast, Madeline and Andrew conform to their family’s wishes with tragic results. They both come from wealthy, insular families who endeavor to ensure their children conform to their values, as depraved as those values are. Madeline’s mother is a racist to whom “the idea of having a Black child in the family was totally unthinkable” (183). As a result, Madeline is pressured into giving up her child, Mia, to Saint Agnes. This is heartbreaking for Madeline and has tragic results for Mia, who is kidnapped and sex trafficked. Madeline goes along with the scheme for fear of losing the only support system she has. Andrew DuPont was likewise raised with a deplorable set of values by his father, who taught him to see women and girls as sex objects. He eagerly joins in Preston DuPont’s management of the Dionysus Theater. In these cases, conforming to parental expectations has tragic, horrific results.
The Influence of Setting on Narrative Tension
In The Orphanage by the Lake, the setting is used to create tension. There are two main locations: New York City and Lake George. Daniel G. Miller uses elements of light, weather, and landscape in each of these locations to create feelings of fear, suspicion, and uncertainty.
In general, Hazel feels at home in New York City. She enjoys taking long, leisurely walks along its crowded streets to take in the crowds and the landscape while thinking about the case. This shows how at ease she is in the city. She pauses in Hudson River Park to take in its natural beauty on “one of those beautiful fall New York days when anything seems possible” (33). Her baseline level of comfort makes it even more terrifying when the setting turns menacing. When she is being pursued by Madeline’s assistant, Hazel is afraid and the city seems to turn against her: “[T]he sun dips lower, and shadows stretch across the pavement, obscuring faces and making everyone look like a potential threat” (36).
The darkness is a key element of what makes the city setting seem frightening. The darkness is echoed in another instance when Hazel is shaken by what she saw at the abandoned theater. As she walks away, she notices that “the charcoal overcast of the afternoon makes it feel like night […] every face, every sound, every shadow spooks you to the core” (164). The setting, and Hazel’s response to it, makes events even more frightening.
The rural environs of Lake George and the spooky environment around Saint Agnes increase the tension Hazel experiences. Although Lake George is a beautiful summer vacation area, in the fall it becomes a hostile, cold environment. When Hazel first arrives at Saint Agnes, she is struck by the harshness of the environs, noting how “the wind whips across the hill, and the trees have shed some of their colored leaves” (48). She connects this stark environment with the feelings it generates, thinking, “it is as though they’ve stripped the place of any excess, any color, any joy […] it seems a lonely place” (48).
As the weather becomes even more intense, the narrative tension ratchets up as well. Hazel finds herself in the middle of a storm in Lake George. She notes that “blurry, rain-soaked spruces line the highway like soldiers” (216). This martial metaphor foreshadows how Hazel soon finds herself being pursued by police officers in the midst of the downpour. The extreme weather that transforms the setting into something menacing and impedes her visibility makes the chase even more frightening. The terror inspired by the events in the narrative is thus heightened by the dramatic settings.
