Size
The novel begins with the protagonist alluding to the crimes of her ex-husband. "How big was his crime? Bigger than a breadbox, smaller than Chernobyl." This ambiguous and nebulous referencing of her husband's crimes continues throughout the book. The narrator often uses vague metaphorical comparisons to avoid being explicitly honest.
Pop Culture Reference
The protagonist starts a new life after divorce as an unlicensed massage therapist. It is the third client that turns things around. "My first thought was, Olive Oyl." This is a pop culture reference as metaphor. Olive Oyl is Popeye the sailor's girlfriend, notable for being tall and extremely skinny. Just in case anyone doesn't get the reference, the metaphor is explained with a straightforward description of the client, Julie, using the word "long" six times to describe various anatomical features.
The Whale
A major turn in the narrative comes with the arrival of a beached whale. Upon first coming upon the sight, the effect is weird. "It was as if we had suddenly entered a world where everything was much bigger, no longer human in scale." In addition to the simile here, the whale itself will become a metaphor endowed with multiple symbolic meanings. It all begins at this moment, however, as the whale is situated in a way which makes human problems seem less substantial by comparison.
Animals
Perhaps connecting with the relationship between the narrator and the whale, she begins to create metaphorical associations between herself the animal world. "Finally, reluctantly, I emerged from the tub with an amphibian slither." The comparison of her movements to those creatures moves effortlessly from water to land and back again also serves to draw attention to the shared mammalian properties of humans and whales.
Crime Scene
The whale is too large to be disposed of and must therefore remain beached until the process of decomposition runs its course. "It looked like it had been murdered somewhere else and then thrown onto the beach by giants who were aiming for the ocean and missed." By this point, it seems clear that the narrator is seeing herself symbolized by the whale on some level. She, too, is the victim of a crime that has left her life forever altered by others beyond her control.
