People are changeable like water (simile)
To adapt one of the novel's own quotations, people always fit others in slots – prostitute, housewife, saint – like sorting the mail. Astrid hates labels anyway, because people are “so mutable, fluid with fear and desire, ideals and angles, changeable as water.” There is no need to cover somebody’s name in mud, because people can change their life for the better. They even can change their character and habits.
Empty beauty (simile)
People more often judge others by appearance as they judge Astrid. How can anybody confuse truth with beauty? Truth comes with sunken eyes, bad teeth and gray hair. People feel pain and betrayal, when they get to know the truth. At this time, “beauty is empty as a gourd, vain as a parakeet.” It is because beauty always deceives and hides the real soul of a person. It is hypocritical and empty.
Despair is a murderer (metaphor)
Astrid has a very difficult situation. However, people get into much worse trouble and survive. Astrid’s main enemy is not a killer, who is waiting for her behind the house. “Her real killer is desperation.” She needs to be ready for fight at any moment, to hold hope in her hands, sheltering from the wind like the last match during a long polar night. Astrid should hide from despair. She should hide behind courage and bravery, because she cannot overcome despair, killing it with a weapon or a knife. Astrid has to fight with the help of emotions such as determination and courage.
Astrid is Ingrid’s hindrance (metaphor)
Ingrid is a beautiful woman, a metaphorical a free bird perhaps. However, this woman has been dragging her aching leg all her life, and “this aching leg is her daughter Astrid.” One day, she left her daughter with a nanny for one year. Ingrid is confident that her daughter is her life problem that prevents her from being free, to marry successfully and to do what her soul desires. Her child does not let her dreams come true, because she gives all her power, attention and care to Astrid. It is very painful for a girl to realize that she is troubling her mother's life, but she is not going to give up.
