Opening line
“The Oppenheimer triplets—who were thought of by not a single person who knew them as `the Oppenheimer triplets’—had been in full flight from one another as far back as their ancestral petri dish.” The very first sentence in this novel engages the hyperbolic power of overstatement to immediately provide insight into main characters and its plot. The “full flight” reference alludes to the haste with which they desire to break from one of another. “Ancestral petri dish” is especially effective because it is such a strange image to use in reference to human conception while also foreshadowing the literal nature of their conception.
Foreshadowing
In a novel structured with a non-linear chronology like this, metaphorical imagery can be especially effective for the use of foreshadowing. Johanna contemplates the reality that “all the money in the world could not adjust the very long horizon before her, nor the lonely road she would need to walk in order to reach it. That road, as it turned out, would be even lonelier than she had reason to fear.” At this point, Johanna is nearly fifty years old and facing the prospect of raising a newborn infant all the way through childhood. It is an especially tough situation to face such an unknown future and this language both conveys her anxiety and hints that things are only getting tougher.
Emotional intensity
Another example of a situation where metaphorical language can be especially effective is during those moments of great emotional intensity. This effectiveness is double when the moment precedes the explosive release of emotions. An example of such a moment is when “Lewyn’s antennae rose. It was right there. Right there. And he was helpless against it. And the words hammered away inside him, howling for release—say it, say it!” The metaphorical allusion to the antenna suggests a logical awareness, leading to the more visceral image of the emotional turmoil represented by the hammering imagery. By the time the primitive animalistic metaphor of howling gives way to an exclamatory order from his conscience that is italicized for added emphasis, he almost has no control over the next thing that comes out of his mouth, no matter how shocking it will be.
