54 pages • 1 hour read
Meagan ChurchThe Last Carolina Girl
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2023A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Symbols & Motifs
Leah’s Quilt
Stitched together by her mother, Leah’s quilt symbolizes her nuanced understanding of home and family. Leah cherishes the quilt as a rare family heirloom, one of her few physical reminders of her parents. Though Leah never knew Emma, aside from Harley’s few shared stories, she feels connected to her by analyzing her mother’s artistic abilities, which is evident in the quilt’s beautiful design. Leah also enjoys creative, artistic endeavors. Like her hair and eye color, Leah cherishes the traits she inherited from her mother, celebrating their genetic bond while wishing she could know her mother in different ways.
Leah’s quilt additionally symbolizes the critical aspects that create a family bond. She seeks her quilt for comfort after experiencing an epileptic seizure: “My head dropped, my shoulders slumped, and my tired body longed to be under the quilt again” (10). When she moves into the Griffins’ home, the quilt is one of her few possessions, which she shelters under whenever she feels especially stressed or lonely. Leah wants a family that will shroud her in love, warmth, acceptance, and protection. The quilt serves as a tangible symbol of these desires, representing Leah’s longing for emotional security and belonging.
Stars
Stars are an important motif in the text, often symbolizing Leah’s aspirations and her desire to connect with others. Like the quilt, stars provide comfort to Leah. Stargazing connects her to other people she cares about, including those who are no longer alive. Often, Leah experiences moments of peace and clarity while observing the cosmos, during which she gains insights about herself, her journey, and her aspirations for the future. While stargazing with Jesse on her birthday, Leah explains, “The brightness of the sun outshines them in the day. We can only see the stars in the dark” (39)—a statement that reflects Leah’s understanding that moments of hardship and darkness allow for introspection and growth. The stars symbolize hope and resilience in the face of adversity, reminding Leah of the enduring beauty and possibility beyond the challenges she faces.
The stars also provide an outlet for Leah to work through her feelings about how she feels like an outsider and longs for a stable family. Leah shares the story of Zeus, Callisto, and Arcus with Michael Henry while she points out Ursa Major, the Great Bear constellation. Leah describes a non-traditional family (Callisto was Zeus’s lover, Arcus their child born out of wedlock) that prioritized love and protection of each other. This mythological tale parallels Leah’s quest for acceptance and understanding within her own familial relationships. Despite societal norms and expectations, Leah recognizes the value of love and support in defining a true family.
The Ocean
The ocean, with its deep waters, symbolizes life’s often threatening and dangerous unknowns. Harley recounts a tale of a woman who marched into the ocean to her death, her wave-beaten body recovered a few days later, missing chunks of flesh from ocean creatures’ nibbles. Harley cautions, “You don’t ever know what lies beneath’ […] And he was right; the murky waters of the Carolina coast kept hidden their secrets” (252). Just as the ocean conceals its depths and dangers beneath its surface, so, too, does life present unforeseen challenges and hidden truths that Leah must navigate.
Despite its perils, Leah persists in her aspiration to live by the beach, a dream dismissed and criticized by everyone except Jesse. To Leah, the shoreline represents more than just a geographic location—it embodies freedom and a refuge from the societal injustices that have plagued her existence. Her beachside home at the novel’s end reinforces the importance of the ocean in Leah’s sense of identity and autonomy.
