The second chance gone wrong
The story begins when Jason and Shannon decide to get married, even though Jason is on parole for the violent murder of his ex-roommate, a woman. The second chance is implied both by Shannon's willingness to give him another shot at life and also by the fact that Jason is on Parole, which is something of a literal second chance at life, albeit with serious restrictions.
The newlywed rapist
The rapist is also a newlywed. He has been married to Sharron for only a month when he decides to kidnap and rap two innocent women.
The brokenness of the jail system
Although criminals deserve to face the consequences of their actions, Shannon finds herself deeply confused by the criminal detention systems. In prisons, the pressure is for criminals to do crime for other criminals in the prison, or else pay the price (often in blood). This means that the prison creates criminal organizations by design (more or less). She also speculates that actually, criminals are even worse after they go to jail than when they went in.
The daunting world of criminal justice
One would suspect issues of justice might be very straightforward, but that couldn't be further from the truth, especially not in American law, and especially not in American criminal proceedings. There is so much jargon and policy that the layman could never be expect to understand, so basically, who knows what's really going to happen after all for any particular case. This leaves Shannon feeling powerless and flustered.
Competitions of victimhood
One of the unfortunate aspects of the story is Shannon's honest depiction of her obsession with the particular victims of her husband's crimes. Much like a cheated wife will want to know more about the girl, Shannon wants to know why her husband chose these two to betray her. But there's a serious ethical issue with this because Shannon's victimhood seems cancelled out by the two criminal victims. She doesn't know what she's allowed to feel, and although she never says it plainly, one must assume the book itself constitutes Moroney sharing the perspective she felt was largely ignored in media coverage.
