Rules of Civility

A young woman in her early twenties who spends the final months of 1937 navigating romance, ambition, and social circles in New York City.

A charming, well-connected young banker with royal-blue eyes whom Katey and her roommate Eve meet in a Greenwich Village jazz bar on New Year's Eve 1937; his poise draws both women in over the year that follows.

Katey's vivacious, reckless boardinghouse roommate, whose life takes a sharply different turn after an accident partway through the year the novel covers.

A quietly wealthy, unpretentious friend of Tinker's who teaches Katey to shoot skeet and later leaves New York to fight in the Spanish Civil War.

A sharp, worldly older woman who moves in the same elite circles as Tinker and takes a keen, not entirely explained, interest in Katey.