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Emily is Lara and Joe’s daughter, the older sister of Maisie and Nell, and the girlfriend of Benny Holzapfel. She’s a pragmatic and forthright person, and she plans to make the most of her knowledge of modern farming techniques when she takes over running Three Sisters Orchards from her parents. When she was a teenager, she was furiously hormonal and moody, insisting to her mother that Peter Duke was her father and that she didn’t belong in Michigan. As the oldest of Lara’s daughters, Emily often assumes a position of leadership; as a teenager she ruled the farm through intimidation. Though her sisters sometimes resent it, she also guides and influences Nell and Maisie in adulthood, although much more kindly. Her sense of responsibility toward the farm is juxtaposed with her sisters’ more detached attitudes to cherry-picking life. Where Maisie and Nell have always seen themselves as having futures outside of Traverse City and their childhood home, Emily feels a strong connection to the land and the life her parents have built. Similarly, while Nell and Maisie show varying degrees of interest in their mother’s stories and the farm’s future, Emily remains deeply invested in both because of her emotional connection to Peter Duke and to inheriting Three Sisters Orchards. Although she’s scared of the future and anxious about the environmental disasters she feels are approaching, she is also actively seeking to continue the family’s legacy by uniting her parents’ property with the neighboring Holzapfel farm.
Unlike Lara, who once entertained dreams of an acting career and a life far from her New Hampshire upbringing, Emily doesn’t want to define herself by leaving her past behind. This is also clear from her choice of spouse, as Benny and his family live on land that adjoins Three Sisters Orchards and the two grew up together. She recognizes the value of the land and the lifestyle it could potentially provide her. Like Lara, Emily understands the weight of familial responsibility, and she shows a similar capacity to put others’ needs before her own. However, Emily differs from Lara in that she doesn’t regret not pursuing a different way of life. While Lara looks back on her past with Peter Duke and sometimes wonders what could have been or if she did enough, Emily remains resolutely focused on practicalities.
