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Chapter 10
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Woman in Cabin 10, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Entrapment and Isolation
Perception vs. Reality
Trauma, Mental Illness, and Resilience
Ambition and Compassion
Wealth and Power
Summary
Analysis
Nilsson explains that Cabin 10 had been reserved for another guest who withdrew from the trip at the last minute. He asks how much Lo had been drinking last night, and Lo angrily retorts that she hadn’t drunk enough to lose the ability to distinguish fantasy from reality. Nilsson says he cannot pursue the situation further without proof and that they will revisit it in the morning. He takes down Lo’s description of the woman and leaves.
Nilsson is put into a difficult position by Lo’s insistence that he raise an alarm without any proof of foul play, but Lo is furious about not being taken seriously, and worried about the missing woman. Her feelings of helplessness surrounding the robbery no doubt feed into her present reactions.
Themes
After Nilsson leaves, Lo is too wired to sleep. She’s furious, but a nasty voice in the back of her head suggests that maybe Nilsson is right—after all, Lo attacked her boyfriend in a panic and was frightened by a door slam the day before. Maybe she isn’t the most reliable witness. Yet Lo can’t dismiss what she saw and heard; there must be a murderer onboard, and nobody knows but her.
Aware of the ways her anxiety has played tricks on her, Lo briefly wonders if Nilsson was right to dismiss her fears; yet she’s sure of what she saw, and she won’t let go of that fact.
Themes
