she is dead

She is dead. She does not appear physically but haunts mentally. She
is Codi and Hallie's mother Alice, the late wife ofHomero Noline.
Throughout the novel Animal Dreams by Barbara Kingsolver Alice
impacted the characters, action,and theme(s). When Alice passed
away she took part of Homer with her. What she left was a misfit of time
and circumstance;an emotionally distraught and distant man who
attempted to resemble a father but veered more towards the tin man.
Homero existed beyond his wife as only a page out of an instruction
manual, the one with the caution statement. Homero's delicate heart
decided that the only way to endure Alice's death was to flush any
remembrance orresemblance of her out of his fortified technical realm
which throughout the novel becomes increasingly skewed. Kingsolver
pushes home this idea by omitting Alice from any of Homer's frequent
flashbacks which are usually mishapsfrom the past involving his
daughters. These incidents are his only recollection of his daughters'
estranged childhood inwhich he strained to create slippery and
unmothered women. Homer's fear of becoming attached to
anything which reminded him of Alice resulted in an unorthodox
childhoodfor Hallie and Codi. Homero was more of a child mechanic than
a father. Retaining only his technical aptitude afterAlice died all he could
do was provide his kids with orthopedic shoes and the correct medicine.
When not fixing Codior Hallie's present or future ailments Homero took
photographs of natural objects and slyly transformed them into
man-made devices by doing what he seemed to be best at, distorting
images. Codi, similar to her father mentally blocked out her past.
Her childhood remained within her as only a series ofstained and
misplaced memories. Codi attempted to follow in her father's emulsion
lined footprints, fixing every one oflife's problems with an internal wrench.
By approaching life from behind this falsified image Codi managed to
distanceherself from everything and everyone who could have hurt her.
One aspect of life and time in which Codi was bred tobe distanced from is

the past. As Codi grew older she began wondering about her family's
past. Homer basically toldher they had no past. So with no past and no
identity, Codi lived, searching for security and stability through a
motherfigure. Everywhere Codi went she managed to find a mother
figure. Whether it be a man or a woman friend or evenHallie, Codi hid
herself in other's security. This search for stability is catalyzed by the lack
of a mother in Codi'schildhood. The lack of maternal instinct in Codi left
her with no sense of direction, therefore; she searched aimlessly
foryears, for herself.When Codi returns to her childhood home in Grace,
Arizona she discovers she does have a past, both in herlifetime and prior
to it. Contrary to what Homero told her, her original family was from
Grace, her roots were there. The absence of Alice lays down a theme for
the novel: you must return to your roots to find your identity. This is
feasiblebecause Codi had to come back to her family's origin and her
mother's resting place to finally find her self. Throughout the novel
Animal Dreams there is an invisible presence which effects the
characters, action, andtheme. The reason why this presence is so
dramatic and forceful is the fact that it is a spiritual presence, one which
wewill never meet.