Fire
The predominant visual imagery in the novel is fire. The second section of the book is a newspaper report of a man who apparently accidentally died trying to escape a conflagration. From the point out, fire imagery is persistent and varied:
“Jed was a firefighter”
“If she ever decided to put out all the fires she’d started, all the boys would be using crutches.”
“It felt like I was swallowing fire.”
“her hair…looked like a fire on a mountain”
To reveal the narrative stimulation behind this imagery would be a complete spoiler, but suffice to say such imagery is mere accident.
Stories-within-a-Story
Very early on, Larry informs the reader vaguely of being involved in an accident which has affected his memory before asserting that “If you were to tell me a neat story, I’d be able to tell it back to you years from now, word for word.” This particular aspect of his personality then manifested through a series of different stories told to him that he relates to others. These stories—The Blue Monkeys of Corruption, the Dogrib woman who cut her hair, the tribe of six puppies—all serve as metaphorical imagery underlining the emotional issues impacting Larry and the events which caused them.
Monolexicon
The book contains several instances in which multiple words are spoken together so as to come out as single word:
“sunova!”
“Ohmigod”
“Manohman”
“Getthehellouttahere”
These examples of monolexical recurs often enough to serve as imagery, but to what purpose? The purpose is primarily a thematic incarnation of the novel’s composition structure. Two different narratives are taking place simultaneously: the chronological being straightforwardly told by Larry and the flashback narrative which is told in a far less linear and more abstract manner. The second narrative only appears as an intrusion into the first so that they often seem to be just a single story just as the monolexicon appear to be a single world when in fact they are not.
Cryptic Narrative
The non-chronological narrative that solves the mystery of Larry’s “accident” and his memory problems are initially revealed by the narrator through cryptic imagery that won’t make any sense until all the pieces of the puzzle are finally put together by the reader. At the same time, however, these cryptic statements are often so bizarre and out of context that they serve to define Larry as something quite different from the other characters:
“(And listen to my black teeth scream)”
“I am my father’s scream.”
“Itchy Bum! (No Butterflies for Jesus)”
