In The Truth of the Matter, Agnes is a somewhat repressed, emotionless person who has been thrust into circumstances she didn't want or ever think about having to shoulder all by herself, so she puts up a wall to hold her feelings in check and under control at all times. Much like many women of that time period may have done, because women of that time were more chattels than human beings and society put those mores on them 'for their own safety'. With the war effort and more women starting to grow and work outside the home than ever before, those same women started coming alive and feeling like they had rights to many of the same emotions that men had taken for granted for so many years. Agnes began the process slowly and with lots of consternation and effort, but finally became the sensual woman she always knew deep inside that she was. Her family grows and she again becomes the caretaker in many respects, and has to repress herself somewhat again, and against her will this time. Life goes forward and the truth of the stories eventually comes out and Agnes finds herself again freed to live her independence, though many don't think that she should. This book is full of tension, truths and lies, and the determination to live in the present with the past ever rearing its head to be patted back down into that pillow of past intensities.

It would be more than a bit helpful to the new reader of Dew if they got The Evidence Against Her to read before going into this book, just so that they would know the characters and the roles beforehand and not have to make them up as they read.