The boys are forced to steal from the white neighbors in order to care for the sick puppy. Ward also demonstrates how race is a factor in the face of tragedy. Her attachment to China, a new mother, is revealing of this. As Esch deals with her pregnancy, she is reminded of the loss of her mother at a young age, especially being surrounded by only males. This work conveys the struggles brought on by a natural disaster, while relating it to race and family.

The story concludes with the calming of Katrina, the family returning home, shocked by the damage to their community, and anxiously await for China to return to them. By the end of the novel, Daddy has found out and eventually vows to care for Esch and her unborn child. At only fifteen years old, and emotionally invested in her casual relationship with him, she is terrified. Throughout the novel, Esch is also dealing with a problem of her own: she is pregnant with her brother Randall’s friend, Manny’s, child. When the family’s house floods and they are forced to swim to a nearby higher house, China comes loose and gets lost in the water, devastating the family. When one of her puppies falls ill with Parvovirus, Skeetah, Esch’s brother, devises a way to steal medicine from the white neighbors. Throughout the novel, China is a significant figure, as she is so important to the family.

Ward begins by writing of the family’s dog, China, giving birth. Each of the twelve chapters conveys the events of a single day, as told from the perspective of Esch, a fifteen year-old-girl living in Mississippi with her daddy and teenage brothers. Jesmyn Ward’s Salvage the Bones illustrates one family’s experience of Hurricane Katrina in the days surrounding the disaster. Location: Residence Hall Florida Ave Circulating Collection

Salvage the bones a novel