Lillian Booth is the middle daughter of an overbearing planter known as the Captain and a delicate Southern woman who lives in a dream world of sorts.

Her older sister, Emily, is devoutly religious and often hostile to Lillian; her younger sister, Eugenia, is sick with cystic fibrosis (a factual oversight on the author's part is that CF was not technically named until 1938, by Dr. Dorothy Andersen,[2] and the book appears to be set shortly before and during the Great Depression.

Eugenia dies from smallpox due to being weakened from cystic fibrosis, a genetic disorder that is not understood at the time that the novel takes place.

Therefore, when Lillian asks for Dawn to be renamed Eugenia many years later, it may be an attempt to get back the little sister she lost so early and loved so much.

Not knowing how to restore The Meadows, Captain Booth begins to drink heavily and more often, which results in him falling down the stairs and breaking his leg.

The death is blamed on childbirth and her mother is buried right after Lillian gives birth to a baby girl, which she names Charlotte.

Although she wants to take Charlotte with her, the Captain refuses, thinking that someone may find out Lillian is really her mother, so she has to leave her baby behind.

Determined that no man will ever control her again, she gradually becomes the brains behind the management of the hotel, though Bill remains the public face.

Despite Bill's complaints that he will grow up to be a "mama's boy", Lillian takes Randolph everywhere with her, letting him play in her office while she conducts her business negotiations.

She goes back to visit the Meadows only a few times, as she finds it hard to deal with how dilapidated and dingy it has become, and also to see Charlotte growing up without really knowing her.

Despite the fact her husband has affairs and is never half the family man he promised to be, she is satisfied that nobody will take her son from her and that she is secure as the mistress of Cutler's Cove.