Animal Dreams Earth Quotes

How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)

Quote #7

The body would stay there. She had requested of somebody, at some point, that she be buried in Nicaragua if that ever had to happen. She said Nicaragua could use the fertilizer. (24.4)

For Hallie, as for Loyd, part of loving a place means going back into it when you die. Hallie found her home in Nicaragua, so that's where she wants to be laid to rest.

Quote #8

When he catches up, a little breathless, she is standing with her boots on the ground like rooted stalks. Standing beside the old plot where Hallie used to grow a garden. A few old artichoke bushes have gone thistly and wild around its perimeter. Codi drops the knotted bundle and goes to the tool shed to retrieve a shovel. She comes back and digs hard into the ground. It hasn't been disturbed for many years.

"Are you sure this is a good place?" he asks. (27.4-5)

This is Doc's perennial question about Grace: is it a good place? In this scene, with its image of Codi rooted in the ground, we can see that she's finally decided it is.

Quote #9

The tops of the flat tailing mounds were dimpled with rain-catching basins and I'd noticed that springs of rabbitbrush were starting to grow up there. (28.12)

One of the last images we get to see is of the ground beginning to recover now that the mine has stopped abusing it. Symbol alert: Codi's own internal progress matches the recovery of the land. Maybe things will be okay here, in time.