The motif of Capri and its cliffs establish the novel’s paradoxical atmosphere, where idyllic luxury masks constant, mortal danger. The island is an active force, a place Shirley Hazzard describes as gathering “sacred monsters” (4) who are drawn into its mythic, perilous beauty. For the Lingates, Capri is both a private paradise and a gilded cage where they are forced to confront their history annually. The stunning views and opulent villas provide the stage for Maintaining Wealth to Gain Impunity, but the island’s geography offers a constant, threatening counterpoint. This duality is captured in Helen’s observation that “Capri seems to be constantly falling into the sea. And perhaps something a little threatening about it, too. The ground always shifting” (68). The sheer cliffs are the most potent manifestation of this threat, functioning as recurring sites of violence and death. Marcus and Renata are pushed from them and Martina’s body is found beneath them. The ever-present possibility of a fatal fall symbolizes the precarity of the Lingates’ social standing and the violent consequences of their secrets, turning a landscape of immense beauty into a theater of death.

Water is a recurring motif representing the repository of buried secrets and the overwhelming threat of being consumed by them. The novel opens with Lorna at sea, a position that elicits a “familiar, bland horror” and the question, “Is this how I die?” (13). This initial moment establishes the sea as a claustrophobic and dangerous space. Throughout the narrative, acts of violence culminate in the water. Lorna’s near-drowning of Helen is a desperate act of self-preservation that foreshadows her own lethal tactics, while the discovery of Lorna’s (actually Martina’s) and Sarah’s (actually Renata’s) bodies confirms that the sea is where the Lingates’ crimes eventually surface. The title itself, Saltwater, ties the corrosive, truth-revealing nature of the ocean to the family’s own toxic history. Characters are pulled under literally and figuratively by secrets, guilt, and the actions of others. The water is the final resting place for the family’s victims, a dark archive that cannot hold its secrets forever. Ultimately, this motif demonstrates that what is submerged in the name of self-preservation will inevitably be brought back to the light by an unforgiving tide.