53 pages • 1 hour read
Back Roads
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Themes
Parental Abandonment
Content Warning: The source material and this guide contain discussions of sexual and physical abuse, and incest.
Abandonment is defined as an action that leaves a person feeling left behind, undesired, insecure, or discarded. At the beginning of the novel, Harley feels abandoned by his mother, who has been incarcerated for murdering his father. Harley, as the eldest of the Altmyer children, has become the de facto head of the household, left to raise his sisters on his own, a responsibility he feels utterly unprepared for. His sense of abandonment is complicated by the fact that he feels he abandoned his mother as well by not dealing with his abusive father himself. As the novel progresses, however, new truths come to the surface, revealing just how profoundly Harley has been abandoned by both his parents.
Harley often considers the reason why his parents got married, assuming it was because Bonnie was pregnant with him. However, as his memories of his parents’ relationship surface, it becomes clear that there was a deep love between Bonnie and her husband. Indeed, Bonnie refused to let her lawyer use physical or sexual abuse as a defense in her trial. When Harley visits Bonnie in prison for the first time since her conviction, he is surprised to find her healthy and content, which makes him wonder if his mother wants to be in prison. Bonnie’s confession that Misty shot their father while attempting to kill Bonnie supports Harley’s suspicion. While Harley initially assumes Bonnie killed her husband to defend her children, the revelations around his father’s murder show him that Bonnie never cared about protecting her children, before or after their abusive father’s death.
At the end of the novel, Misty points out that Bonnie was never a victim of her husband’s abuse. This supports the idea that Bonnie abandoned her children the first time her husband hit one of the children and she did nothing to stop it. By choosing her husband over her children, Bonnie helped create the dynamic that caused Amber to seek out Harley after beatings. Not only did Bonnie abandon her children, but she also forced them to grow up faster than they should have. While their father may have been more overtly abusive, by the end of the novel, it is clear to Harley that he and his siblings were abandoned by all the adults in their lives. Back Roads illustrates the profound effects of parental abandonment and one young man’s struggle to heal.
Sexual Abuse and Trauma
Harley has a sexual relationship with Callie, an older married woman, and a history of incest with Amber, his sister. The novel uses these relationships to explore the different ways in which abuse impacts survivors. From the beginning of the novel, Harley has an uneasy relationship with sex. He has never had sex and feels pressured to have sex soon. Harley attempts to have sex with one of Amber’s friends, but when she is aggressive with him, he panics and reacts violently. Harley turns to Callie in a moment of emotional upheaval brought on by Amber’s sexual advance toward him. As an older woman, Callie doesn’t represent the same threat Harley appears to feel around girls Amber’s age. Harley also has sexual thoughts about his therapist, Betty, another older woman.
Harley knows Amber is having sex, which he strongly disapproves of. When he catches her having sex in the house, his response—burning a couch—is extreme. He explains that he is afraid of Amber getting pregnant because he doesn’t want another child to care for, but his obsession with Amber’s sex life is one of the novel’s first suggestions of their complicated dynamic. As time passes, it becomes clear that Harley is obsessed with Amber’s sex life. As Amber’s behavior toward Harley alters, and Misty normalizes incest in Jody’s mind, Harley remembers sexual touching between him and Amber when they were young. Harley realizes his sexual thoughts about Amber and his inability to be intimate with a girl Amber’s age stem from his shame and embarrassment at having been sexually touched by Amber when they were little.
Harley’s relationship with Amber illustrates the mental toll sexual abuse places on a survivor. His choice of Callie as a lover reflects Harley’s need for a mother figure and his search for comfort and intimacy. Both relationships leave Harley with emotional scars that eventually lead to anger and violence.
Consequences of Adult Responsibilities Too Young
Harley becomes the head of his family’s household at the age of 18 when his mother is convicted of killing Harley’s father. The responsibility is overwhelming, but Harley has no choice. His father’s family has abandoned him and his sisters because of Bonnie’s actions, and the community shuns them for the same reason. Harley is proud that he and his siblings manage to survive without welfare, but having such serious, demanding responsibilities at such a young age nonetheless takes a toll on him.
The difficulties of caring for his siblings by himself are compounded by the specific traumas Harley and his siblings have experienced. When he learns the truth behind his father’s death and his buried memories of sexual touching with Amber resurface, Harley finds himself struggling to deal with this information. Harley develops a fear of Misty because of her actions, and he vacillates between love and hatred for Amber. Harley is not experienced enough to see that Amber is struggling in the same way he is, and he also cannot grasp that Misty’s actions are a product of their parents’ abuse and neglect.
Harley’s situation is also complicated by the scandalous circumstances surrounding his father’s death. Through no fault of his own, Harley and his siblings have become pariahs in their community, and he faces resistance when he seeks outside help. For example, the bank refuses to give Harley an extension on the mortgage in the aftermath of the trial and the school district refuses to provide Jody with daycare. There comes a point where Harley buckles under the weight of the responsibility and announces to his mother “I’m done.” However, Harley’s deep love for his sisters prevents him from abandoning them like she did. Harley’s devotion to the family directly contrasts with his mother’s neglect and shows the drastic difference in their personalities.
Harley’s role as head of household also directly contrasts with his father’s character. Harley’s father was a stereotypically masculine man; he went hunting and drank beer in front of the television after work. Harley is less interested in hunting and more interested in art. Harley also places the well-being of his siblings above his own interests and refuses to engage in violence. Although Harley is a responsible adult at a very young age, the toll of his childhood and the weight of responsibility eventually pulls him down and forces him to accept help.
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