49 pages • 1 hour read
Adele MyersThe Tobacco Wives
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2022A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 18-22Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 18 Summary
On the Fourth of July, Mitzy holds a birthday party for Ashley, and Maddie hopes to continue talking about the issues they’ve discussed regarding gender roles and the expectations placed on women. As Ashley explains to Maddie, “[w]e’ve all been taught that our husbands call the shots. God forbid we should ever have an opinion of our own” (235). David and Maddie leave the party to watch fireworks from an old, covered bridge that was instrumental in transporting tobacco across the river and outside of Bright Leaf, cementing it as a major trade operation. David and Maddie share their first kiss.
Chapter 19 Summary
While Maddie starts her day’s appointments, there is an emergency with Mitzy: Maddie learns that Mitzy is pregnant, and she has been bleeding and in pain. Ashley enlists Maddie’s help getting Mitzy to the hospital. While there, Maddie notices all the incubators in the nursery, observing how the babies are gaunt, small, and need feeding tubes. Dr. Hale blames the rise in incubated babies on the number of women in the workforce, stating that they need to “get back home where [they] can focus on a woman’s real job, getting our next generation here safely” (247). As Dr. Hale examines Mitzy, Maddie sees the trails of smoke above every bed in the maternity ward and is sickened by the smell of MOMints. Dr. Hale assures Mitzy that the baby is fine and recommends that she rest more and reduce her busy schedule, telling her that “not getting enough rest can disrupt the female hormones […] ladies are delicate and need to treat yourselves as such” (249). He brings her a pack of MOMints; Maddie is disgusted and wonders how he could proudly recommend cigarettes when he knows the results of the maternal studies.
Chapter 20 Summary
Maddie returns to the Winston home to find David there with Anthony, and she confides in them both about everything she knows, realizing that she cannot keep it to herself any longer and needs help. She learns from David that Mitzy was devastated last fall when she lost a baby girl right before the due date. Maddie is distraught when David and Anthony try to rationalize the letter, believing that Mr. Winston and Dr. Hale have the situation under control and that the foreign cigarettes used in the study are not the same as Bright Leaf. David tells Maddie that she’s overreacting and that the men wouldn’t put women in harm’s way. Anthony starts to understand how much is at stake for the Hales, with Rose as the star of the ad campaign and Dr. Hale as a chief part of the MOMints creation in the lab. Though David is skeptical given his closeness with the Winstons, they devise a plan to ask Dr. Hale about the health risks of smoking without giving away what they know.
Chapter 21 Summary
Maddie and David visit Dr. Hale at his office to execute their plan. David tells Dr. Hale that he had a terrible asthma attack on the Fourth of July, and Maddie is worried about him. Dr. Hale makes crude remarks about Maddie and David’s relationship and sexist remarks about women and then examines David, announcing that his lungs sound better than ever. David lies and tells him that he’s concerned after hearing two men discussing the dangers of smoking in the Bright Leaf lunchroom one day, and he worries that his mother’s smoking habit is what caused his asthma. Dr. Hale assures David this isn’t true and produces a scientific study he has conducted with a colleague that proves the benefits of nicotine and mint for treating anxiety. Maddie and David are relieved.
Alone for a moment with Dr. Hale, Maddie accidentally reveals that she has seen the letter and is grateful to know that the results of the Swedish study are false. Dr. Hale corners her alone and reveals that Aunt Etta has pneumonia that he has been treating with penicillin; he threatens to stop treatment if Maddie doesn’t give him the letter. He also threatens to destroy her dress business and living arrangements with the Winstons. He threatens to ruin the lives of Frances and Etta as well, telling Maddie that the town turns a blind eye to them because of Etta’s history with Mitzy, but he doubts that “their kind would be tolerated elsewhere” (269). As he’s raising his voice at Maddie, Cornelia walks into his office and confronts him. Though she doesn’t know what the issue is about, Cornelia takes Maddie with her and asks her to reveal what was happening. She knows that her son only gets angry when threatened and surmises that Maddie must have something on him. Maddie promises to tell her but asks to return to the Winstons’ home for now.
Chapter 22 Summary
Maddie tries to regain her composure after Dr. Hale’s threats. She knows that she must act quickly and wisely. She sees a manila folder that Mitzy referenced earlier, calling it Richard’s boring old plan. Maddie reads the six-pronged plan for MOMints that Mr. Winston had initially outlined in response to Dr. Hale’s letter and expands on here: advertisements featuring the town’s wives “with the most desirable appearance and social standing” (277); doctor recommendations using official language so that women feel safe and protected; “studies” that tout the effectiveness of mint oil generally since a study of women smoking MOMints is not possible; getting the word out before news of the negative studies emerges; giving away cigarettes to get them wanting more; and emphasizing patriotism and preference for American goods and opinions. Maddie is horrified at the confirmation that Dr. Hale and Mr. Winston knowingly deceived women—even their own wives—so that they would distrust the credible and accurate research when it became public knowledge. She is further outraged when she realizes that they not only lied to the women, but they also used them in advertisements to sell their dangerous product. Maddie resolves to find a way to tell Aunt Etta and Mitzy.
Chapters 18-22 Analysis
These chapters build toward the climax through a major turning point regarding The Moral Dilemma of Uncovering Uncomfortable Truths. Maddie realizes that Mitzy is pregnant and encounters the harsh truth of the pervasiveness of tobacco in Bright Leaf at the hospital, made visible through real people. Maddie feels a more urgent moral responsibility to reveal what she knows. Myers uses striking imagery of innocent, helpless babies connected to feeding tubes and pregnant mothers with billows of smoke above their beds to emphasize the stakes of Maddie’s thematic dilemma. It spurs Maddie to action, and for the first time, she understands that she can no longer keep the secret of the health risks of smoking.
Myers underscores the gendered power dynamics that attempt to limit women’s abilities to create change. When Maddie stands up to Anthony and David and pushes back against their insistence that powerful men like Dr. Hale and Mr. Winston can do no wrong, Myers portrays the barriers that women face when appealing to be believed and subverting the structures of patriarchal authority that place Dr. Hale and Mr. Winston beyond reproach. Maddie puts into practice the encouragement from Ashley and Cornelia and wisdom of the texts she’s read, further suggesting the power of the collective to make change. Maddie’s attempts to expose the powerful male figures in Bright Life highlight the theme of Societal Constraints and Female Empowerment. Myers also shows that young people like David, Maddie, and Anthony have the ability to question authority and find creative ways to confront it.
These chapters contain the climax of the novel when Dr. Hale threatens Maddie. They establish Dr. Hale as the antagonist of the novel and his characterization as a manipulative, threatening man. David and Maddie are astute in realizing that they can appeal to his “authority” as a physician, knowing that he will gladly boast about his accomplishments and be flattered by their interest. Dr. Hale quickly unravels when he knows that he’s been caught, but he attempts to first manipulate and threaten Maddie into handing over the letter, then appeals to his social status and influence to intimidate her. Myers both suggests his reliance on patriarchal power structures and presents him as an unsympathetic figure.
This section explores the motif of advertisements when Maddie sees the large MOMints ad in Dr. Hale’s office and when she discovers the detailed advertising plan that Mr. Winston crafted. These advertisements relate to the theme of The Contrast Between the Opulent Façade and Hidden Realities of Society because Maddie now knows that women are being used as props to advertise the very product that they should be avoiding. The large photo in Dr. Hale’s office portrays a picture-perfect image: mothers, all outfitted in shades of green, seated under a large oak tree with their blond children, dressed in angelic white. The sickening reality is that those mothers have experienced child loss and those children, just like David as a young adult, could go on to experience the damaging effects of cigarettes. Bright Leaf is selling a false promise based on slick advertising schemes, not science, and Myers uses this to highlight the power of advertising to hide reality and the danger that it can cause when exploited by those in power.
