Dry

Hunting and animals are recurring sources of comparison in Dry. Kelton first uses this metaphor to describe how his family views themselves compared to others. The McCrackens consider themselves “herders,” while other people are divided into “wolves” and “sheep” (29-30). As herders, the McCrackens occupy a higher social position, which allows them to outmaneuver both the wolves (the bad guys) and the sheep (the normal people). In the beginning of the novel, Kelton uses this metaphor, which his father explained to him, to relate to others. For example, when he disagrees with Alyssa’s parents’ idea that the government will supply people with water, Kelton begins thinking about sheep and how unaware they are of obvious dangers.

Alyssa uses similar animal language when she first encounters Jacqui. Alyssa thinks, “She makes me think of something I learned in biology. How pack animals that go rogue are always hungrier and nastier, because it’s harder to hunt food without a pack” (133). This evaluation of Jacqui is aggressive, showing Alyssa’s distrust of strangers, as she immediately focuses on Jacqui’s obvious negative qualities rather than the fact that Jacqui just saved Alyssa from harm. Alyssa uses animal language again when the group of kids is stuck at an evacuation center on their way to the McCracken bug-out. She notices how nervous Kelton is, and she thinks, “Kelton is like an animal in a trap, and he’s ready to chew off his own foot to escape” (237). As in the other hunting and animal comparisons, Alyssa takes an emotion that Kelton shows and reduces it to an animal drive.

These animal comparisons all have reductive or divisive tones. They either take human reactions to a terrible situation and reduce them to animalistic instincts or use animal metaphors to reduce and divide humanity into mostly unflattering subgroups. The repeated use of animals as symbols for people shows how the Tap-Out dehumanizes people, contributing to the novel’s sense of societal deterioration as the crisis worsens.