Imogene is one of two protagonists in “Procreate, Generate.” She’s characterized by her physical appearance—“tiny, all-white,” dainty—and how it contrasts with her inner features. She loves birds and devotedly fills 22 bird feeders every evening, traits that show her to be nurturing as well as disciplined. Imogene assigns herself nicknames like Ice Queen and Pipedream, revealing both a negative self-image and a tendency to withdraw from confrontation and intimacy. She internalizes her infertility, seeing it as a sign of weakness and a personal failure.

Imogene’s experiences explore social attitudes, gender norms, and stigmas surrounding procreation. She recognizes that in other cultures and other times, her infertility might lead to her being shunned or even killed. She still faces other social pressures and double standards, however. Her boss admonishes her for taking too much time off to attend medical appointments, illustrating the difficulties women often face trying to balance competing priorities of motherhood and work. The narrative emphasizes the substantial physical toll of fertility tests and treatments on Imogene, acknowledging how women sacrifice their bodies for the sake of procreation.

The death of Imogene’s parents when she was 21 is a source of trauma, one that impresses on her the idea that life is fragile, and loss is inevitable. Her primary conflict in the story, coping with infertility, reinforces this idea and contributes to the collection’s exploration of identity and loss. However, the story’s emphasis on the tension between life and death ultimately reveals that both are part of the natural cycle of creation and destruction, a cycle that illustrates The Balance Between Loss and Renewal. Imogene’s arc within the story shows a transformation in how she responds to hardship. After her fertility treatments fail, she resists the temptation to run away, to “get up and leave her life” as she did when she moved to Morocco following her parents’ deaths (103). Instead, she finds the courage to try again, revealing her inner strength.

Herb Ross is one of two protagonists in “Procreate, Generate” and Imogene’s husband. As a molecular phylogeny professor, Herb has an in-depth understanding of heredity and evolutionary relationships. He sees his future child within the context of the entire human species, a juxtaposition that illustrates The Intersection of Personal and Collective History. Herb’s physical appearance and the description of him being “of no special courage” portray Herb as an exceedingly average man (87). His main conflict within the narrative is coping with infertility, which presents a potentially insurmountable barrier to his goal of conceiving a child. In the context of human history, procreation is so ubiquitous that it’s often dismissed as a simple matter. The story’s depiction of infertility contradicts this dismissive view, showing the detrimental effects it can have on a person’s life and relationships.

These detrimental effects manifest largely as strain on Herb’s marriage. Like his wife, he faces temptation when it comes to choosing how to cope with the conflict of infertility. Herb is tempted by advances from an attractive college student whose youth leads Herb to suspect she may be more fertile than his wife and therefore able to help him fulfill his dream of fatherhood. She also appears to offer the affection and reassurance that his wife struggles to give, illuminating how the contrast in Herb and Imogene’s methods of coping with infertility creates a potential for rifts. A faith in things unseen, inspired by the memory that the stars “are up there during the day, too” (110), gives Herb hope. This creates resilience, which helps him and his wife through their struggles.

Fifteen-year-old Allison is the protagonist of “The River Nemunas.” She’s most significantly characterized by recent trauma and upheaval in her life: her parents’ death and a subsequent move from Kansas to Lithuania. Allison’s fascination with Emily Dickinson is also a subtle yet meaningful source of characterization. She relates to themes of isolation in Dickinson’s poetry as she deals with grief and a sense of alienation.

Allison faces two interrelated conflicts in the story. The first is coping with grief over the loss of her parents and home. She refers to her emotional pain, at its most intense, as the Big Sadness. It feels overwhelming and nearly unbearable. Allison feels guilty that she’s able to quote Emily Dickinson but can’t remember a single sentence spoken by her parents. Part of her character arc involves cultivating and cherishing memories of her parents as a way to honor them and preserve their legacies and identities.

Developing the collection’s theme about Memory’s Role in Identity, Loss, and Preservation, Allison’s grief stirs a longing for connection to her mother via her mother’s childhood and homeland. She wants to understand the experiences that shaped her mother’s identity. Catching a sturgeon in the River Nemunas, as her mother often did, becomes Allison’s goal. Her grandfather’s insistence that sturgeon can no longer be found there creates conflict and adds symbolic depth to Allison’s efforts. Her faith, which requires belief in things unseen, helps her cope with her parents’ death, but Grandpa Z’s disbelief in her sturgeon sighting symbolizes his lack of belief in an afterlife or soul, challenging the idea that a part of Allison’s mother is still with her. By catching the sturgeon, she demonstrates the presence of things unseen and the value of faith. In the process, she connects with nature and the river, and through them her mother’s history.