Thematic guide to the American novel

Acknowledgments

Introduction

Abandonment

Absurdity of war

Alienation

American dream

Battered women

Being and becoming

Bereavement

Betrayal

Community

Compassion

Corrupting power

Courage

Cultural conflict

Death

Disabled

Duty

Emotional abuse

Family

Fathers and sons

Friendship

Greed

Grotesques

Healers

Immigrant life

Imprisonment

Independent women

Injustice

Journeys

Knowableness of god

Loneliness

Loss

Love

Male behavior

Masquerading

Mothers and daughters

Multiracial offspring

Nature

Oppression

Outsiders

Quests

Rejection

Responsibility

Revealing family history

Search for a father

Search for identity

Storytelling

Suicide

Survival

Trials

Value of land

Appendix a: additional suggested themes and topics

Appendix b: guide to suggested themes in american novels

Author/title index

Subject and character index.