The Undercutting of Rosie and Adam Summary, Characters and Themes
The Undercutting of Rosie and Adam by Megan Bannen is a fantasy novel that blends humor, divine entanglements, and emotional depth with high-stakes adventure. At its heart, the story follows Rosie Fox, a marshal cursed with immortality, and Adam Lee, an inventor whose past is far more legendary than he admits.
Set in a world where portals to the Mist threaten both mortals and gods, the novel explores themes of friendship, grief, identity, and what it means to live fully when life itself feels endless. Through Rosie and Adam’s reluctant partnership, the book examines resilience, complicated family bonds, and the possibility of finding love amid chaos. It’s the 3rd book in the Hart and Mercy series by the author.
Summary
Rosie Fox, a marshal known for her fiery hair and equally fiery temper, works at Tanria’s West Station with her partner, Penrose Duckers. When the magical portal begins malfunctioning, she insists on fixing it herself, only to be struck dead by a surge of energy.
Death, however, is temporary for Rosie—cursed by her divine parentage, she revives, her body healing unnaturally fast. Her reckless actions earn her the wrath of Chief Alma Maguire, who tasks her and Duckers with escorting Adam Lee, the reclusive inventor sent to repair the failing portals.
Rosie dreads the assignment, unsettled by a prior encounter with Adam that left her emotionally scarred.
At the same time, Duckers struggles with grief over the death of Roy Birdsall, a man he considered a father, and the return of his ex, Zeddie. Rosie stands by him at the funeral, where she is unexpectedly moved by Roy’s daughter Mercy’s eulogy.
Later, Rosie meets Hart Ralston, Mercy’s husband, who reveals his own experiences with death and resurrection as the child of a death god. For the first time, Rosie feels a kinship with someone who understands her endless cycle of dying and reviving, though she keeps her own divine connection secret.
Adam Lee arrives at West Station and quickly clashes with Rosie, though he is equally disturbed by the strange shadows within the portal that only she can see. Their mission takes them through Tanria, where Adam collapses from exhaustion but presses forward.
When the portal malfunctions again, Rosie, Adam, Duckers, and Zeddie are trapped inside. Forced to rely on one another, they find shelter, share food, and begin to confront old wounds and new feelings.
Rosie and Adam, in particular, form a tentative bond despite her distrust and his reluctance to reveal his past.
Their situation worsens when attempts to reopen the portal fail and the Trickster—Rosie’s estranged father—makes a destructive appearance. Supplies are delivered by Gobbo, who explains that he moves through the spectral plane where neither gods nor mortals belong.
Meanwhile, Rosie discovers that Adam shares her ability to perceive the spreading vines. His collapse forces him to confess his true identity: he is the Briar Thief, cursed with immortality after attempting to steal it from the gods millennia ago.
The briar plant lives within his body, sustaining him but also tormenting him. Rosie, shocked but understanding, realizes that they share the same burden of an unending existence.
The group forms a plan: Adam will attempt to repair the portal while Rosie scouts for a safe exit. During her journey, she grows increasingly drawn to Adam, who surprises her with moments of vulnerability and kindness, even as he battles his terror of dragons.
In one of their lighter interludes, he plays music for the group, and Rosie reveals her hidden gift of singing, bringing them a rare sense of joy despite their peril.
Eventually, Rosie and Adam stumble into another realm: the Salt Sea, where they encounter the Warden and the Salt Sea god. These deities challenge Adam for his past theft, but Rosie defends him fiercely.
Together, they reach the ruins of the Old Gods’ garden, where Adam begs Rosie to help him tear the briar from his body. With excruciating effort, she succeeds, leaving him mortal for the first time in centuries.
But the briar still lingers, and to destroy it completely, someone must pluck its last flower. Rosie offers herself, but the Trickster, for once acting out of love rather than selfishness, sacrifices himself instead.
His death transforms him into a star, and the briar collapses into dust, ending its curse.
Rosie and Adam survive, now both mortal. They are escorted home by the Mother of Sorrows, who confirms Rosie’s immortality vanished with her father’s death.
When they return, they discover seven years have passed. The Mist is gone, the world has changed, and their friends have built new lives.
Duckers and Zeddie, as well as Hart and Mercy, welcome them back with joy. Rosie finds a final letter from the Trickster, expressing remorse for his failures as a father and declaring his love.
In the epilogue, Rosie and Adam embrace their newfound mortality. No longer cursed to live forever, they choose to live fully.
Together, they travel, reconnect with friends, and build a future not defined by divine interference or eternal suffering. What once was a burden becomes liberation, as Rosie and Adam step into a life that is fragile but deeply meaningful.
Characters
Rosie Fox
Rosie Fox is the fiery heart of The Undercutting of Rosie and Adam, both in temperament and destiny. With her copper-red hair and unsettling red eyes, she is immediately set apart from others, not just visually but by her immortality—a curse inherited from her divine Trickster father.
Rosie’s immortality does not free her from pain; each death wounds her body and soul, and the cycle leaves her physically scarred and emotionally brittle. Her recklessness, such as slapping malfunctioning portals, masks deep exhaustion with her endless existence.
Rosie balances cynicism with loyalty, fiercely devoted to her partner Duckers and protective of her chosen family. Her relationship with her father is fraught with resentment and reluctant pity, shaping her longing for genuine love and stability.
Despite her flaws, Rosie’s empathy—crying at Roy Birdsall’s funeral or comforting Duckers—anchors her humanity. Her connection with Adam Lee evolves from reluctant duty to profound intimacy, as she sees in him a mirror of her own struggles with immortality.
Ultimately, Rosie’s arc is one of acceptance—learning that mortality, with all its fragility, is a gift rather than a curse.
Adam Lee
Adam Lee, the enigmatic inventor and eventual revelation as the Briar Thief, is the novel’s most complex figure. To the outside world, he is a brilliant yet reclusive engineer, but beneath that polished exterior lies millennia of torment.
Trapped in immortality after attempting to steal it for humankind, Adam has lived countless lifetimes, inventing and creating, but never escaping the briar vine embedded in his chest. His intelligence is matched by his profound weariness; he describes his life as mechanical, a hollow cycle of existing without joy.
Meeting Rosie forces him to confront both his vulnerability and his buried capacity for love. His growing bond with her—through moments of humor, music, and shared resilience—humanizes his otherwise guarded persona.
The reveal of his immortality aligns him with Rosie, forging a deep kinship between them. Yet Adam’s story is also one of redemption: he confronts his hubris as the Briar Thief and accepts mortality again, choosing love and life over the endless pursuit of control.
His journey is that of a man learning to value fragility over permanence.
Penrose Duckers
Penrose Duckers is the steadfast anchor of Rosie’s chaotic life. As her partner, he balances her recklessness with pragmatism, often exasperated by her habit of dying in the line of duty but unfailingly loyal.
His grief over the death of Roy Birdsall and his complicated emotions toward his ex, Zeddie, reveal his depth and vulnerability. Duckers represents constancy—he is the friend who stands by Rosie no matter the cost, offering both tough love and unconditional support.
His breakdown while trapped in Tanria underscores his humanity; unlike Rosie or Adam, he does not carry divine resilience, making his fear and despair deeply relatable. His reunion with Zeddie, and the tenderness it rekindles, demonstrates that even in a world of gods and immortality, simple human love and companionship remain the most enduring forms of salvation.
Zeddie Birdsall
Zeddie Birdsall brings warmth and levity to otherwise grim circumstances. As Duckers’s ex and a talented chef, his presence complicates the emotional dynamics within the group.
Initially the source of tension—his soufflé delaying their escape—Zeddie gradually redeems himself by providing comfort through food, humor, and kindness. His reunion with Duckers allows old wounds to heal, and their rekindled affection becomes a source of hope amid despair.
Zeddie’s role highlights the importance of small joys—meals shared, laughter sparked—even when the world is collapsing. He is a reminder that survival is not only about escaping death but also about finding reasons to live.
Hart Ralston
Hart Ralston, though not as central to the plot, plays a pivotal role in offering Rosie rare companionship in her struggle with death. His revelation about dying and returning because of his divine parentage bridges a gap of understanding that Rosie had never found with anyone else.
His refusal to let her take shortcuts toward ending her curse shows his care, even as it frustrates her. Hart represents resilience and the quiet burden of living with divine inheritance, much like Rosie and Adam, but unlike them, he has chosen to step back from that world.
His steady presence reassures Rosie, grounding her in the reality that even those touched by gods must make peace with mortality.
Mercy Birdsall
Mercy Birdsall is a quieter but powerful presence. As Roy Birdsall’s daughter and Hart’s wife, she embodies grace and strength.
Her moving eulogy at her father’s funeral leaves a mark on Rosie, who rarely lets her cynicism falter. Mercy serves as a symbol of resilience through grief and love through hardship.
While she does not participate in the adventure within Tanria, her impact on those who do—particularly in the way she inspires Rosie’s empathy—is undeniable. Mercy reminds the others, and the reader, of the enduring weight of family and the human connections that anchor them in a divine-tangled world.
Themes
Immortality and the Burden of Eternal Life
Immortality in The Undercutting of Rosie and Adam is not depicted as a blessing but as an exhausting and isolating condition. Rosie Fox, cursed to revive every time she dies, experiences a cycle of pain, loss, and alienation that prevents her from leading a normal life.
Her immortality creates distance even in her closest relationships, as seen in Duckers’s frustration at her repeated deaths and revivals. This theme is intensified through Adam’s revelation as the Briar Thief, who has lived for centuries with the weight of his failed quest for immortality, trapped at the age of thirty-three.
Both characters embody the destructive side of eternal life: for Rosie, it is an endless cycle of suffering and fractured identity; for Adam, it is stagnation, regret, and the futility of endless reinvention. The novel interrogates the allure of immortality by showing how it strips away the natural progression of human existence—growth, change, and ultimately, peace in death.
By the end, when both characters are restored to mortality, the story frames finitude as a gift rather than a curse. Mortality brings meaning to relationships, choices, and sacrifices, suggesting that life gains its deepest value precisely because it is limited.
Family, Legacy, and Complicated Parent-Child Bonds
The story repeatedly returns to the theme of strained familial ties, particularly through Rosie’s fractured relationship with her father, the Trickster god. Their dynamic captures the tension between love and resentment, as Rosie struggles with the constant demands of a parent who craves validation yet fails to provide support or stability.
The Trickster is selfish, manipulative, and often dismissive, yet his final act of sacrifice—plucking the briar flower and giving his life—reframes his legacy in Rosie’s eyes. It illustrates how parents, despite their flaws, leave lasting marks on their children, sometimes only understood in hindsight.
Adam, too, wrestles with legacy, haunted by his role as the Briar Thief and the myth that has shaped centuries of history. His immortality prevents him from creating a family or passing down traditions, which adds poignancy to the Mother of Sorrows’s revelation that he can finally have children as a mortal.
Both Rosie and Adam’s arcs show that family is never straightforward: it is shaped by disappointment, misunderstanding, sacrifice, and ultimately, the possibility of reconciliation. The theme highlights the way legacy is built not from perfection but from flawed individuals choosing, at times, to act selflessly.
Friendship, Loyalty, and Chosen Bonds
The novel foregrounds the importance of friendship and chosen bonds as a counterbalance to strained family relationships. Rosie’s partnership with Duckers is one of the emotional anchors of the story.
Despite his irritation at her recklessness, he consistently remains at her side, a testament to loyalty that transcends irritation or hardship. His vulnerability at the funeral of his father figure, Roy Birdsall, and later his reconciliation with Zeddie, reveal the healing power of steadfast companionship.
Similarly, Rosie’s friendship with Hart offers her rare solace, as he is one of the few who understands what it means to straddle life and death. These friendships serve as reminders that chosen bonds can provide the stability and understanding that family often cannot.
In the bleakest moments—being trapped in Tanria, facing shadowy vines, or confronting despair—it is the loyalty of companions that allows survival and emotional endurance. This theme underscores the novel’s suggestion that connection is not dictated solely by blood but forged through shared hardship and mutual trust.
Sacrifice and Redemption
Sacrifice permeates the narrative, from Hart’s earlier willingness to die to rid Tanria of undead, to Rosie’s repeated physical suffering, and finally to the Trickster’s climactic self-destruction to destroy the briar. Each sacrifice is layered with meaning: some are made out of duty, others from desperation, and some from love.
The Trickster’s act is particularly significant because it contrasts with his earlier selfishness, reframing him as capable of redemption at the very end. Similarly, Adam’s confession of his identity as the Briar Thief reflects his attempt to redeem centuries of mistakes that perpetuated suffering.
Rosie herself offers to sacrifice her life in the Old Gods’ garden, revealing her willingness to bear the burden for others. Through these moments, the novel insists that sacrifice is not only about loss but also about transformation, allowing characters to reclaim dignity, heal broken relationships, and redefine their roles in the world.
Redemption, in this sense, is never complete erasure of past failures but the courage to make meaningful choices despite them.
Love, Mortality, and Human Connection
The developing relationship between Rosie and Adam brings together several central themes of the novel: mortality, companionship, and the yearning for connection. Both characters, weighed down by centuries of loneliness, find in each other someone who understands the unique pain of immortality.
Their bond is complicated by secrecy, mistrust, and the ever-present danger of Tanria, but it evolves into a deep partnership rooted in mutual recognition of vulnerability. When both regain mortality, their love gains a new dimension—it is now shaped by the finite nature of human life.
Instead of an endless cycle of survival, they can live fully, embracing fragility and the inevitability of death. The choice to settle into ordinary life at the end reflects the novel’s ultimate assertion that love, grounded in shared human experience, is more meaningful than power or eternity.
In this way, their romance is not an escape from the burdens of immortality but a redefinition of what it means to live and love when time is limited.