60 pages • 2-hour read
Fever Beach
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Symbols & Motifs
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of sexual content and racism.
Fleeing the Scene of an Accident
The narrative begins with Figgo fleeing the scene of his hit-and-run against Noel Kristiansen. He accepts no responsibility for his actions, blaming Kristiansen himself for the incident. He tries to convince people like Viva and his mother that he was not at fault, because despite his consistently terrible actions, he wants to be seen as a moral person. This establishes a motif that runs throughout the remainder of the text.
In Chapter 8, after Galaxy crashes the Aston Martin, Clure flees the scene without a second thought for the safety of a woman he believes to be an intoxicated minor. Like Figgo, his only concern is himself. Later, he almost regrets that Galaxy has survived the accident, because “his abandoning her at the scene [propels] her on a reckless, vengeful path” (152). What concerns Clure is not the immorality of leaving Galaxy alone at the scene, potentially seriously hurt or dying—it is how people will react to learning that he was in the car with her in the first place.
In Chapter 10, Figgo rides his bike into the side of a termite truck. Even though he himself fled the scene of an accident in Chapter 1—an accident that he was at fault for—he is incensed when he learns that the blameless termite truck driver has fled the scene of this accident. He makes up fantasies about the driver being an undocumented migrant worker, even a gang member, because he cannot accept that he caused the accident. He is confused and irritated when Corporal Dominguez repeatedly comments that the situation is “ironic,” because for men like Figgo and Clure, the idea of taking personal responsibility for their own actions is incomprehensible. This motif helps to demonstrate the novel’s assertion that there is a significant difference between the pretense of morality and actually being a moral person, supporting the theme of Authentic Morality Versus Moral Facade.
Darcy’s Dream Booty
The sex toys that Figgo steals from the warehouse where he works become an absurd symbolic motif that conveys how ridiculous and self-involved many of the novel’s far-right characters are, supporting the novel’s exploration of The Nature of Political Extremism. The “Darcy’s Dream Booty” is a soft plastic object shaped like a woman’s lower torso, designed as a masturbation aid. Its form suggests that the men who use it are not interested in a genuine sexual connection with a living woman but instead an encounter with an objectified, partial, and artificial representation of a woman.
The name “Darcy’s Dream Booty” is intended to be amusing and highlight the role of self-involved fantasy in the sex lives of the men who use the product. Giving the sex toy the name “Darcy” ironically underscores that there is no real-life woman involved in this product. The diction “Dream Booty” conveys that the sex toy is nothing more than a silly, immature fantasy. The narrative frames Figgo, Onus, and Claude’s devotion to the Dream Booty as both titillating and pathetic, making the three men the object of ridicule.
That Figgo uses these comical objects as a form of currency among the Strokers for Liberty undermines the group’s credibility and reinforces the idea that the ideology of the group is, figuratively, “masturbatory.” They all go out of their way to talk themselves up and put others down to make themselves feel superior. With the introduction of the Dream Booty, however, Hiaasen frames their superiority as a fantasy, and any pleasure they get from it as self-indulgent nonsense, as detached from reality as the Dream Booty itself is.
The Aston Martin
The symbolic motif of the Aston Martin is introduced in Chapter 5, when Clure tries to give Nicki the keys as a bribe to forget about her divorce proceedings. Nicki throws the keys into a fountain. The car itself, a custom DB11, costs $300,000 and symbolizes the corrupt privilege and power of people like the Boyettes, supporting the theme of The Corrupting Influence of Dark Money. Nicki’s casual dismissal of Clure’s gift shows her scorn for the way he misuses his power. In Chapter 8, Clure uses the same car to bribe Galaxy, indicating that his cocoon of wealth and power makes him believe the women in his life are interchangeable, all susceptible to manipulation by the same trappings of privilege. That Galaxy almost immediately wrecks the car foreshadows the way that she will eventually cause the downfall of Clure himself.
Twilly is able to appropriate the second Aston Martin—the one Clure intends to use as a replacement bribe for Galaxy—because he himself is a wealthy man. He essentially bribes the dealership to give him the car by offering to pay well over invoice. His motives are more elevated than Clure’s, certainly, but his ability to make this deal happen is another illustration of the way money corrupts. His possession of the car erodes Clure’s power and motivates both Nicki and Galaxy to work harder to punish Clure for his transgressions. At the end of the novel, this second Aston Martin finally becomes Galaxy’s, showing that—with Twilly’s help—she has ultimately succeeded in taking for herself the power that men like Clure once held over her life.
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