Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Family, Responsibility, and Growing Up
Love and Fear
Social Structure, Reputation, and High School
Lies vs. Honesty
Summary
Analysis
As usual, Kitty wakes up before the sunrise on Christmas morning. Daddy makes waffles, and everyone takes turns opening presents. Margot loves her scrapbook, and Lara Jean is excited about her Scottish cashmere sweater. Santa (Daddy) clearly shops at Costco, since he brings printer ink and pens in addition to water guns. Kitty is disappointed there’s no puppy.
Christmas morning is a time for Lara Jean and her family to show each other how much they care. Daddy finally has the opportunity to support his daughters practically with the Costco gifts and the waffles.
Themes
As Daddy heads into the kitchen to attend to the waffles, the doorbell rings. He yells for Kitty to get it—and Kitty shrieks. Margot and Lara Jean run to see what’s going on and discover a puppy in a basket. Kitty screams thank you at Daddy, and when she calms down, Daddy explains that he got the puppy from the shelter two nights ago. Ms. Rothschild has been hiding him and brought him over. He’s a terrier mix, and Kitty decides to call him Jamie Fox-Pickle. She patiently spends the day taking him outside. Lara Jean wishes she were still little enough for a puppy to be able to solve all her problems. Peter never calls.
Daddy might not be as distant from his daughters as it seems—he’s clearly been paying attention to Kitty’s demands for a puppy. And Kitty immediately demonstrates her maturity by taking Jamie Fox-Pickle outside, all by herself. For Lara Jean, though, this is bittersweet—she realizes that her problems are too big and complicated for a puppy to make her feel whole again. Being older, she realizes, isn’t as fun as she might have hoped.
Themes
