You are dead.

Your spouse is dead.

You are dying.

Your spouse is dying.

You just don’t get it.

You actually do get it, but only in the final ten pages of the book is this revealed.

You were a little bit wild when you were a young adult, which is completely imperceptible now, except when certain music is played.

You once had astoundingly good taste in fashion, and you’ve kept all the clothing from that time, even though you now mostly wear “Life Is Good” T-shirts with joggers.

You once lived in Manhattan, and you tell your kid about that six-month period with surprising frequency, given that it comprises less than three per cent of your life thus far.

You are good at cookies.

Your kid’s friends think you’re the best. Your kid/the book’s protagonist has a more jaundiced view.

You have a surprising talent that will be disclosed in the final third of the book—something like riding horses, driving fast, making a layer cake, styling hair, or robbing a bank. (Note: You will not actually rob a bank, but your knowledge of how to do so will prove very handy.)

If your spouse is alive, you have a great relationship with them, even if you sometimes have to work extra hard to find time to connect—a concept you will lovingly explain to your child/the book’s protagonist, who will respond, “O.K., O.K., that’s enough!” when you drop the slightest hint that said connection is sex.

If your spouse is dead, you are in no way interested in finding a new spouse, right up to the point when you suddenly are engaged to be married, which you will thoughtlessly announce to your child/the book’s protagonist at an extremely inopportune time.

You are far more willing to apologize than most human beings.

You know just when to keep silent, when to speak up, and when to chuck your child/the book’s protagonist on their shoulder and say, “You know I’m proud of you, right?”

You apparently no longer have an interior life of your own.

You are good at lasagnas.

You are inexplicably drawn to the idea of owning a com­pletely insane pet of some kind.

Even though you have a degree in music from Carnegie Mel­lon, you think high-school musicals are the zenith of high culture.

You are good at orange slices.

In order to maintain your life style, you would have to spend up to eight hours a day shopping, but this is never depicted.

You are good at cups of hot cocoa.

You are a fully realized, modern woman with a six-figure in­come, meaningful work, and a family who loves you, but you just cannot stand some other mom in the car-pool line.

You sleep like a rock, except on nights when it’s helpful to have you wake up in the mood to make a midnight snack.

You have made a lot of rules for your children yet will com­pletely ignore them when it’s convenient to the plot.

There is nothing you would rather do than drive five hours to watch your kid/the book’s protagonist march around with their high-school band for fifteen minutes and then have literally twenty seconds of interaction with them before appar­ently driving all the way home again.

You are good at trail mix. ♦