Not exactly Alice Pieszecki‘s chart from the L-Word, but here’s a quick introduction to the characters in the Hobbs series with the author’s idea of how they look.
Liz Stolz
Formerly chief of surgery at Yale-New Haven Hospital, Dr. Elizabeth “Liz” Stolz is a world-renowned expert on breast cancer and the author of a popular book on the subject. She came to Maine when she purchased Hobbs Family Practice. After forty years, she reconnected with her college sweetheart, Maggie Fitzgerald Krusick. Liz is a local community leader and heads up many town and volunteer organizations.
Maggie Fitzgerald
After Maggie broke up with Liz in college, she left New York and her dream of becoming an actress behind. She married the boy next door and lived the suburban life until his affair broke up the marriage. While she was a bored housewife, she took up gourmet cooking and went back to school to get her PhD. After her divorce, she made a living as a college professor. She was doing summer stock in Maine when she ended up in Liz’s office with a broken ankle.
Lucy Bartlett
Rev. Dr. Lucille “Lucy” Bartlett is the rector of St. Margaret’s Episcopal Church. She is a licensed psychotherapist with an active practice. She was once a principal soprano at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, but she was blacklisted after she reported a powerful producer for sexual assault. After meeting Susan Gedney, a seminarian at Union Theological, she decided to become a priest and was ordained.
Erika Bultmann
Professor Erika Bultmann teaches philosophy at Colby College. Erika and her mother escaped from East Germany to reunite with her father, a world famous mathematician. Forty years ago, when Erika was a graduate student at Yale, she met Liz, who was doing her surgical residency. Liz encouraged Erika to buy a summer house in Hobbs. She met Lucy Bartlett at a Christmas concert.
Brenda Harrison
Chief Brenda Harrison was born in Brooklyn, New York, and served in the homicide and community relations divisions of the NYPD until retirement. She was hired by the Hobbs PD and moved to Maine with her wife, Marcia, who later died in a car accident. Brenda has been friends with Liz since she bought the family practice. Brenda is interested in Liz’s new PA, Cherie Bois.
Cherie Bois
Cherie Bois joined Hobbs Family Practice as a Physician’s Assistant, but she’s a also a licensed psychotherapist. She grew up in Louisiana, but moved to Maine because her father wanted to come home to die there. She’s biracial but identifies as African American. She hates cops and guns since a state trooper shot and killed her sister at a traffic stop for a minor violation.
Sam McKinnon
Award-winning, Princeton-trained architect, Samantha McKinnon, had a successful career, but now her aesthetic is out of style, so she makes her living doing renovations and custom tile installations. Twenty years ago, she met Liz at a woodworking club in New Haven. Sam bought an old cabin on Jimson Pond and renovated it as a summer house but now lives in Hobbs year round.
Olivia Enright
Olivia Enright escaped humble circumstances to become a Wall Street broker. She clawed her way to the top and founded a successful hedge fund. After her son embezzled from the company, she was forced to sell her controlling interest and left New York in disgrace. At first, her politics and officious attitude turn off the Hobbs community, but she ends up being elected town manager.
Melissa Morgenstern
During the pandemic, Melissa came to Maine to look after her widowed mother. Fortunately, her law firm lets its star trust attorney work remotely. Melissa offers to help Liz find a way to keep Hobbs Family Practice independent, and Liz introduces her to the new assistant principal of the elementary school, Courtney Barnes. Melissa’s tight-knit Jewish family has mixed feelings about the match.
Courtney Barnes
Courtney has just left a marriage, gotten her degree in educational administration, and moved to Maine. She got her job as assistant principal at Hobbs Elementary late in the summer and ended up living in a trailer. She identifies as bisexual and has an adolescent daughter, which presents a dilemma for her love interest, Melissa Morgenstern.
Denise Chantal
Denise Chantal was once the promising countertenor, Dennis Chantal. She’s about to take the final step in her transition, but she’s out of work because the pandemic has shut down all the theaters. When she applies for the job of music director at St. Margaret’s, Lucy is willing to recommend her, but they face pushback from the church and the community.
Amy Hsu
Dr. Amy Hsu is a cardiologist and the second in command at Hobbs Family Practice. Her parents were doctors, and she’s been destined since childhood to follow in their footsteps. She’s left a an abusive marriage and a large group practice in Westchester, NY, to make a new start in Maine. Her past makes her gun-shy about jumping into any new relationship.
Reshma John
At the age of ten, Reshma John was brought to Maine as a refugee from war-torn Sudan. Several parishes in Maine banded together to pay her tuition at an Episcopal boarding school and encouraged her to seek higher education. To give back, she’s decided to become a priest. She comes to St. Margaret’s as a transitional deacon.
Susan Gedney
Rev. Susan Gedney entered the convent at a young age, which provided her an education and a teaching degree. She continued to teach while studying for the priesthood at Union Theological Seminary, where she met Lucy Bartlett. Before she came to Hobbs, her conflicts about Church teachings on sexuality led her to a conservative parish in the Midwest.
Bobbie Lantry
Roberta “Bobbie” Lantry is a nurse practitioner specializing in gerontology. She works part-time at Hobbs Family Practice, sharing the shift with Cherie Bois. She lives in a large house near the ocean with an elderly woman who suffers from dementia.
Emily Bartlett
Emily is Lucy’s daughter from the assault by a producer at the Met. Faced with the collapse of her career, Lucy gave her child up for adoption as an infant. Emily was raised by a loving but highly religious family who didn’t believe in education for girls. At sixteen, she became an emancipated minor and found her birth mother and a new family in Maine. Emily’s high-functioning Asperger’s has given her exceptional talents in music and mathematics.
Tom Simmons
Rev. Tom Simmons knew Liz and Erika when he was a graduate student in math at Yale. He was a student of Erika’s father, Stefan Bultmann. He lost touch with them, but when Lucy comes to his New Haven church to officiate at the funeral of Erika’s mother, they reconnect. A closeted gay man, Tom decides to give up the rectorship of an important New Haven church and comes to Maine to work for Lucy and finally live his life in the open.
Stefan Bultmann
Mathematician Stefan Bultmann was shortlisted for the Fields Medal. He escaped the GDR by requesting asylum at an academic conference. He was finally able to get his wife and daughter out of the country in the trunk of a car. After his wife’s death, he moved into a senior residence in Hobbs. Emeritus professor at Yale, he works with Lucy’s brilliant daughter on her ground-breaking mathematical theorem and helps her further her education.
Rebecca Morgenstern
Rebecca Morgenstern is a reform rabbi and Melissa’s older sister. She knows Lucy Bartlett through an interfaith organization dedicated to helping LGBTQ+ youth. She is married to an Israeli woman and they have twin daughters. She is the literal rabbi that Lucy goes to when she’s troubled with a spiritual problem.
Tony Roselli
Failed classical actor, Tony Roselli, found a new career as the director of the historic Webhanet Playhouse, a summer stock theater going back to the 1930s. He met Liz, a generous patron of the arts, when she first came to Maine on vacation and persuaded her to buy the family practice for sale in Hobbs.
Alina Krusick
Alina Krusick was adopted as toddler along with her sister, Sophia, from an overcrowded Romanian orphanage. Alina escaped from an abusive marriage to a man who ruined her financially. She came to Maine and was taken in by her mother and Liz. She now works as the news director for a Maine TV station.
Sophia Krusick
Sophia was adopted along with her sister, Alina, by Maggie and her ex-husband Barry Krusick. Sophia is the older of the two sisters, steady and successful. She became a doctor, specializing in oncology.
Paul Duvaney
A long-time member of the Hobbs Fired Department, Paul Duvaney has been chief for ten years. After working with Brenda Harrison during the pandemic, they have become staunch allies and friends.
Simone Ballou
Simone Ballou is Cherie Bois’ favorite aunt. She is a retired teacher and elementary school principal. A widow burdened with a big house in Louisiana, she was persuaded by her niece to move to Hobbs.
Teresa Gai
A refugee from war-torn South Sudan, Teresa guy came to Maine with her daughter. In her home country, Teresa was a trained nurse but her credentials were lost, so she must go back to school to get a nursing license. She lives at Bobbie’s house.
Grace Gai
Grace came to the US as a refugee from Sudan with her mother, Teresa. She is interested in nature and science. Bobbie Lantry, who is her landlady, is encouraging her interest in STEM subjects. She attends Hobbs Middle School.
