The Bone Sparrow

Eli is an older boy who shares a tent with Subhi in the immigration detention center. Eli is Subhi’s closest friend, and he explains, “Eli says we’re more than best friends. We’re brothers” (5). Eli lost his entire family when they immigrated to Australia as they were crammed inside a truck with many other people and not enough air to breathe. Subhi calls Eli and himself “Limbo kids” (14), those who either were born inside the camp or have no family left with whom to identify. Subhi idolizes his friend, whom he’s convinced miraculously survived to accomplish something great in his life. Eli shares a love of storytelling and often regales the younger children with his tales of giant whales. He is also the best at all the invented camp games they use to entertain themselves. Despite his popularity, Eli is selfless and puts his safety at risk to run an illegal supply delivery service within the camp, which helps people get access to goods like toilet paper, clothing, and female sanitary items. He is a round character and also somewhat dynamic.

Eli defies all the rules in the camp to preserve his and the other refugees’ dignity. By allowing Subhi to help him, Eli not only offers a chance at daring adventures but also imparts to Subhi a sense of importance and self-worth. Eli serves as Subhi’s protector and friend, but when the Jackets move him to another part of the camp, the separation damages their friendship and leaves Subhi feeling lost and alone.

Once he moves to the Alpha tent, Eli not only becomes physically distant from Subhi but also changes emotionally. Living with adults forces him to grow up overnight, and he becomes more acutely aware of the humanitarian crisis and injustices within the camp. Along with Queeny, the two teens embark on a dangerous quest to bring awareness of the plight of the detainees to the outside world. Simultaneously, they support the Alpha men who begin a hunger strike to protest camp conditions. Subhi’s innocence and inexperience prevent him from fully understanding Queeny and Eli’s motives, and he longs for the days when they just played and existed together without pretense or complication.

Gradually, Jimmie replaces Eli as Subhi’s best friend because she is present and empathetic to his story but also because she lacks the burden Eli carries to help his people. After briefly escaping the camp, Subhi returns to find a melee and Eli in harm’s way. Paralyzed by fear, all he can do is watch as his friend is brutally murdered by Beaver. Eli becomes a martyr in the riot and a startling and tragic reminder of the consequences of the systematic dehumanization of a people group. Subhi can’t forgive himself for not acting to help his friend, but when he realizes that he can’t change Eli’s fate, he resolves to tell his story to find justice and keep his friend’s memory alive. When Subhi hopes for the future, it is Eli’s voice he hears in the waves of the sea and the song of their people reminding him to continue sharing the stories.

Jimmie is a young girl who lives in the outside world near the camp. The author introduces her as a second narrator through a close third-person point of view. When the reader meets Jimmie, she is still in the throes of grieving the loss of her mother while also dealing with a mostly absent father and her wayward, irresponsible older brother, Jonah. Jimmie worries she is losing her memories of her mother and longs to read her notebook full of stories she left behind, but Jimmie struggles with reading and can only stare at the words and touch the pages. Though she doesn’t live inside a detention facility, like Subhi, Jimmie grieves the loss of a parent and wrestles with loneliness and finding her identity. Just as Subhi depends on his imagination and stories to comfort him, Jimmie retreats to her memories like a safe harbor. The narrative says, “But Jimmie likes exploring memories. When Jimmie wanders, her thoughts stop buzzing, and the ache at the back of her head disappears” (53). Answering the call of her curiosity, Jimmie ventures inside the camp fence, thus building a bridge between the outside world and life inside the camp. Jimmie is both round and dynamic as a character.

As they connect through their shared love of stories and humor, Subhi and Jimmie develop a relationship that becomes life-giving for both characters. Jimmie offers empathy and a listening ear for Subhi as he shares with her the realities of living in forced incarceration and Subhi helps Jimmie rediscover her memories of her mum as he reads her words aloud. Jimmie never judges Subhi or pities him, and she doesn’t even flinch when he mentions horrors like lice, disease, and abuse. Jimmie absorbs all his pain and becomes a safe space for Subhi amid anguish and loneliness. Subhi also provides a sense of identity for Jimmie and accepts her as a friend despite her reading challenges and quirky personality. The acceptance she receives from him allows her to be vulnerable and share her feelings. The text reveals her feelings, saying, “Jimmie’s never had a friend she wanted to share everything with before” (130). Jimmie offers physical comfort in her presence and through bringing delicious hot chocolate and detectible food as well as emotional support and compassion. Jimmie shows Subhi the way out of the camp through the weakness in the fence, which in turn saves her life. When Subhi rescues Jimmie, she calls him a hero, and he restores his faith in himself after so much guilt and shame for killing the baby rat and not helping Eli. Through Jimmie, the reader experiences the stark disparities that exist between the freedom of the Outside and the confinement and hardship of incarceration.

Queeny is Subhi’s older sister who once was his best friend. However, due to their age gap and Queeny’s growing resentment toward the humanitarian crimes inside the camp, the siblings have grown apart. Subhi can’t understand his sister’s anger and bitterness, and Queeny becomes frustrated with her brother’s naïve optimism. Despite their differences, Queeny looks after her brother and becomes a mother to him when Maá can no longer be a caregiver. She rescues him after Beaver catches him making a delivery and frantically searches for him during the camp riot. Though Subhi wishes his sister would play games with him and once again share in his childlike wonder of the world, the reader understands that Queeny’s age and experience force her to see the reality of their situation, and her heart and mind are burdened with not only the care of her brother and mother but also the plight of all the people inside the camp. She is round and somewhat dynamic, showing some change across the story.

Queeny and Eli’s activism exemplifies how teenagers can often be the catalyst for change in society, and they both risk their lives to bring awareness to the human rights violations taking place inside the camp. The riot and Eli’s murder open Subhi’s eyes to the truth that Queeny sees, and he finally understands her righteous anger. In the end, Subhi learns that Queeny not only protects him physically but also has been working to protect him emotionally by hiding the truth of his father’s death and delivering him treasures from the Night Sea. Subhi says, “My treasures came from Queeny. Somehow that makes them even more special” (267). Subhi realizes that his sister is a treasure to him, and the novel ends with the siblings mending their relationship through shared grief and the power of storytelling as Queeny teaches Subhi about his ba.