Theodore "Theo" Decker
Theo narrates the novel as an adult. He is smart but academically unmotivated, and is troubled by the death of his mother and his theft of The Goldfinch after a bombing at the Met Museum. He meets Pippa at the Met and immediately falls in love with her. Theo struggles with his mother's death and his own identity, and moves to several homes after her death. He lives with the Barbours, his father, and Hobie, and is forced to constantly adjust to new surroundings. While living with his father in Las Vegas, he becomes friends with Boris, starts using drugs and committing petty crimes. After his father's death, he moves in with Hobie and becomes a partner in the shop, selling fake antiques to keep the shop open. After meeting Platt Barbour in the street, he becomes engaged to Kitsey Barbour, though he still loves Pippa. Theo also loves Boris, and when Boris tells him he stole the painting, Theo follows him to Amsterdam and tries to retrieve it. In a shootout over the painting, Theo kills a man and loses it again. Boris informs the authorities about the painting and is able to split the prize money with Theo. When Theo finally returns to New York, he must face his past wrongdoings, and goes on a roadtrip to buy back all of the fake antiques he sold. Theo also confronts his mother's death, and the guilt he carried with the painting, and the novel ends with his realization that life is worth living for art, and the magic of art and joy.
Audrey Decker
Audrey is Theo's mother, and they are very close. Audrey is from a small town in Kansas near the Oklahoma border, and he describes her as having a warm, merry, and unpredictable quality. She moves to New York as a teen and begins a modeling career which she later gives up to go to college. After Theo's dad leaves them, she becomes Theo's primary caretaker, saving up as much as possible to raise him. On the day of the bombing, Theo and his mother stop in at the Metropolitan Musuem on their way to a conference about Theo's suspension, and Audrey dies in a bombing of the museum.
Larry Decker
Larry is Theo's alcoholic father who takes him in after his mother's death. He is a thief and a liar, and constantly steals from Theo and his mother. After he secretly moves to Las Vegas and starts dating Xandra, he stops his alcohol abuse and starts taking narcotics and opiates. He accumulates significant debts that he cannot pay off, and he tries to force Theo into wiring money to him from a savings account his mother left him. When Larry can't get the money he needs, he starts drinking again and dies in a drunken car crash.
Boris Pavlikovsky
Boris is Theo's best friend in Las Vegas. His mother died and his father is an alcoholic. Boris's father constantly beats him and gets into arguments with him, and Boris ultimately tries and fails to kill his father by leaving him out in the freezing cold. Boris is destructive, impulsive, and very smart. He speaks several languages and has lived in several countries. Theo and Boris start to drink, steal and take drugs together, and they spend most of their time together until Boris starts dating Kotku. After a bad fight, he punches Kotku but keeps dating her. He steals The Goldfinch and tries to tell Theo before he leaves Las Vegas, but decides not to tell him. He moves in with Xandra after his father is transferred to a job in Australia, and eventually starts selling drugs after he joins a crime ring. After a drug deal that ends in a police shootout, Boris loses the painting, and finds Theo in order to get it back. Boris and Theo travel to Amsterdam to retrieve the painting, and after a shootout with some of the people who stole the painting, Boris is shot. Boris leaves Theo for several days after the shootout, and decides to return the painting to the authorities. He splits the prize money he receives with Theo, and they part ways again.
James "Hobie" Hobart
Hobie is an antiques dealer and furniture maker. He is loyal, kind, caring, considerate, and devoted to his work. He meets Theo when Theo brings him his former partner's ring. Theo starts visiting him and Pippa until he moves to Las Vegas. After Theo leaves Las Vegas, Hobie takes him in and they become partners at the furniture store. When Hobie finds out Theo is selling fraudulent furniture, he tells Theo to buy it all back, and keeps his friendship and partnership with Theo.
Pippa
Pippa is Theo’s main love interest. She is a flautist who’s music career is halted. by the bombing at the Metropolitan Museum. After the bombing, she suffers a brain injury and her uncle Welty dies. Both of her parents are dead, so Hobie takes her in until her aunt sends her to school at Mont-Hafaeli, a boarding school for troubled girls. As an adult, Pippa starts dating Everett, a music librarian she meets in London. She is close with Theo, and they share a bond due to their common experiences. Even though Pippa loves Theo, and tells him she loves him back after he leaves her a love letter, she tells him they cannot be together because the weight of their shared experiences could only drag them down.
Katherine "Kitsey" Barbour
Kitsey is one of the Barbours, and becomes Theo's fiancée. She is smart and pretty, but also slightly aloof and largely unbothered by the death of her father and Andy. Kitsey cheats on Theo with Tom Cable, whom she loves. She decides to marry Theo because he makes her mother happy, and they have a painful engagement party. Theo leaves the engagement party to go to Amsterdam, and after his return there is an understanding that their engagement isn't officially broken but also isn't strictly being enforced or upheld.
Mrs. Barbour
Mrs. Barbour is the matriarch of the Barbour family and is formal, composed, and very traditional. After Theo's mother dies she agrees to take him in and tries to adopt him before his father takes him to Vegas. Mrs. Barbour is constantly involved in activities, dinners and fundraisers, but after her husband and son die she becomes much more reclusive. She really loves Theo, and is overjoyed to learn that he is engaged to Kitsey. Once Theo returns from Amsterdam, she does not hold Theo to his engagement, but still invites him to family dinners and maintains their friendship.
Mr. Barbour
Mr. Barbour is the patriarch of the Barbours, and is a warm and caring man who welcomes Theo into his home after his mother's death. Mr. Barbour struggles with mental illness, and is diagnosed with bipolar disorder. When Theo returns to New York after his father's death, he runs into Mr. Barbour, who is experiencing a manic episode and doesn't recognize Theo. A few years later, Mr. Barbour dies in a sailing accident after his boat capsizes.
Andy Barbour
Andy is Theo's middle school friend who is also bullied. Andy is known for being very smart and socially awkward, and bonds with Theo because they both have trouble fitting in. As a kid, he hates sailing with his father and constantly tries to get out of their sailing trips. Several years later, Andy attends MIT and starts to become successful. But, during a sailing trip with his father and Platt, their boat capsizes, and Andy and his father both drown.
Welton "Welty" Blackwell
Welty is one of the partners of Hobart & Blackwell and the original owner of the shop. Welty is a wise, caring, and considerate person. He takes in Pippa's mother, Juliet, who is his half-sister, and helps to raise Pippa after Juliet dies of cancer. After meeting Hobie, he helps Hobie learn about the furniture business and makes him a partner. Welty dies in the bombing of the Metropolitan Museum, and asks Theo to take the painting and to take his ring to Hobie.
Platt Barbour
Platt is the oldest Barbour brother. He is a bully who struggles with money and addiction as an adult. He is frequently expelled as a kid, but is also Mrs. Barbour's favorite child. As an adult, he becomes an editor at a publishing house, and maintains a good relationship with Theo.
Toddy Barbour
Toddy is the youngest Barbour brother. Though he isn't a major character, he is present throughout the novel. He hopes to work at a nonprofit and help disadvantaged young people.
Xandra
Xandra is Larry Decker's girlfriend. She is shallow and vain, but cares for Theo and Boris. She meets Larry while he is still married to Audrey, and they eventually move to Las Vegas together. She is a waitress and spends much of her time doing drugs and playing Baccarat. Theo and Boris steal cocaine from her after Larry dies, and she takes Boris in. Boris helps her pay back her debts, and they part when Boris becomes more involved in drug dealing.
Lucius Reeve
Lucius is a criminal and thief who tries to blackmail Theo into selling The Goldfinch after Theo sells him a fraudulent piece of furniture. Lucius constantly sends letters and notices to Theo, and reveals Theo's fake antiques business to Hobie. Lucius formerly went by Lucian Race, and Welty helped to send him to jail for selling items that he extorted from elderly people.
Naaman Silver
Naaman is a debt collector and mobster from whom Larry borrows money. He seeks out and threatens Larry, and comes to his house several times while Theo is there. After Larry's death, Boris starts working for him.
Tom Cable
Tom Cable is Theo's middle school friend who gets him suspended. After Theo's mother dies, Tom ignores Theo, and they stop being friends. Tom begins seeing Kitsey Barbour, and they have an affair while she is engaged to Theo.
