2. SUMMARY OF PROLOGUE
• Kevin finds Dana in the living room attempting to remove her arm from what
looked like a hole in the wall.
• Dana tried to explain to the cops it was an accident however they do not
believe her. Nonetheless, there were no witnesses and they let Kevin go.
• Kevin and Dana are both traumatized by the situation they find themselves
in however relieved they are where they are.
3. PROLOGUE
FAMILY/VIOLENCE/RACE
• Dana’s amputated arm signifies the extreme violence that is to come
• Kevin, her husband is forced to be away from her during her time of need a
constant theme throughout the book
• Cops detaining Kevin because of the violence that has found Dana. Are
their distrust over the word of Kevin and Dana a symbol of power or
specifically racially motivated.
4. SUMMARY OF THE RIVER
• Newly weds moving into their new home together.
• Dana disappears right in front of Kevin’s Eyes
• Dana finds herself and a peculiar place witnessing a boy drowning
• Dana rescues the boy and brings him back to life before finding herself back
where she came from.
5. THE RIVER
FAMILY/VIOLENCE/RACE
• We are finally formally introduced to Kevin, Dana’s Husband
• We are introduced to Rufus, His mother, and his father (briefly).
• Rufus’s mother is beating on Dana while she is trying to save rufus.
• Rufus’s father shows up with a gun and just before Dana is transported back she
hears a click.
• Why, if Dana only helped Rufus did she encounter so much violence. Could it be the
color of her skin?
6. SUMMARY OF THE FIRE
• Dana is back briefly until she is called back into the past by Rufus
• Dana is confronted with a small red headed boy who has set his drapes on fire
• Dana after putting out the fire starts here long battle of correcting Rufus of
addressing her as well Rufus returns the favor
• Dana realizes she’s traveled through space and time and Rufus is her
relative, knowing that she determines she is not safe where she is at starts a trek
towards Alice’s house.
• When she gets to Alice’s house she encounters the patrollers beating a young black
man.
• After the patrollers take the black man away, she helps Alice and her mother start to
recover from the incident.
• Eventually she has her own encounter with on of the patrollers who has returned and
this whisks her back to Kevin
7. THE FIRE
FAMILY/VIOLENCE/RACE
• Rufus calls Dana some highly inappropriate names which a are racially centered.
Additionally Rufus requires that Dana call him Master or Mister.
• Dana comes to the conclusion that she is related to Rufus and she must protect him.
• During her trek to find Alice and her family she fears violence if she is caught.
• She comes across the patrollers and follows them to Alice’s house where they break
in, take out a black man (who is Alice’s Mothers Husband) and tie him up around a
tree and start to whip him.
• Dana takes care of Alice and her mother after the encounter like family.
• Eventually Alice is encountered by a patroller who came back to get what “he
wanted”. Under threat of being killed for stabbing the patroller because she is a
black woman in the time she again is pulled back to her modern time.
