Salvage the Bones

In Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward, the audience is introduced to the struggles of an African American family in Mississippi trying to get everything together before the terrible storm, Hurricane Katrina crashes onto the coast and wipes everything out. This heartfelt novel introduces to the audience the theme of parenthood/motherhood, the role that the absence of a mother/father had on the children, the role of basketball and the affect it had on the family, the role of dog fighting and how it related to the family, and the character analysis of Esche. The loss of a female figure in their lives has changed the family in order for them to replace that role and comfort each other. To begin with, the theme of parenthood/motherhood is extremely prevalent throughout the novel. The definition of a theme, as it relates to a story, is the central topic, subject, or concept the author is trying to point out. In the novel it is shown that parenthood is both neglectful and brutal with evidence of this all over the novel. Esche’s father is an alcoholic who does not pay hardly any attention to the needs of the family and focuses more on hurricanes than he does on the children which goes hand in hand with the idea of parenthood being neglectful. With the father not paying attention to the kids and with their mother having passed away, the children do not have anyone to show them how to guide themselves through life’s storms and all of the hardships. Also, as it relates to parenthood, there is a sub theme that motherhood, like parenthood, is brutal and terrible, just like storms named after females tend to be worst than those named simply after men. This is evident in China, Skeetah’s female pit-bull that kills one of her puppies because the instinct to kill is already embedded in her brain and the struggle to take care of the puppies was taking its toll on everyone and thing involved. Esche sees this struggle to take care of puppies as a foreshadow of

Cited: Page Ward, Jesmyn. Salvage the Bones: A Novel. New York: Bloomsbury, 2011. Print.