“like cheese-scented fireworks” (Simile, p. 10)
This simile highlights the pleasure the children take in something so simple as a bag of Doritos. Given the dire situation they are living in, finding this formerly commonplace snack is such a special event that popping the bag is akin to fireworks.
“We had walked for almost an hour before I felt the last fingers of the dream loosen from my lower back” (Metaphor, p. 71)
Dreams are a central theme in The Marrow Thieves. In this quote Dimaline demonstrates that dreams are not simply imaginary, insignificant visions. Rather, they are at the center of the main characters’ identity as well as the violent struggle to regain the capacity to dream. Here, Frenchie personifies his dream of his lost brother, Mitch, which he feels so fully that he describes it as a hand gripping his back even after he wakes up.
“He adjusted the pillows under his head and nuzzled into the skin of the made bed like a child” (Simile, p. 105)
Dimaline uses a simile to compare Chi-Boy to a child. In this way, she highlights an unusual moment of vulnerability for the normally serious, stoic character. Faced with an excessively comfortable bed at the abandoned Four Winds Resort, even “the fierce scout” Chi-Boy becomes goofy, innocent, and child-like.
“A man without dreams is just a meaty machine with a broken gauge” (Metaphor, p. 142)
Miig’s metaphor compares dreamless people to machines with a broken gauge. They are like machines because they have become mere devices for performing tasks. Physically, they continue to function. But psychologically and spiritually, they are totally lost. This is why Miig says their gauge is broken. A gauge is an instrument that measures the amount or contents of something, for example, fuel in a machine. The metaphor indicates that in losing their ability to dream, people have lost their sense of direction and motivation along with their ability to know how they’re doing in life.
“She unfolded it halfway to tuck RiRi’s soft blankie inside and then folded it back over, her grief inside grief like the blankets themselves.” (Metaphor, p. 235)
Dimaline uses the metaphor of blankets to illustrate Wab’s grief. Wab has suffered significant trauma during her life. Because of this, she is fragile and unstable. The group must keep moving and they hardly have time to process their incredible grief due to the loss of RiRi and Minerva. Wab handles this by neatly tucking her grief away deep inside her, just like she tucks the blanket of one lost person into the blanket of another lost person, so that she is able to carry on.
