Usually when the author describes the terrain in Florida from Roy's perspective, he calls it flat. Having come from Montana where there were jagged mountain peaks, Roy can't get over how flat Florida is. When Roy ventures out of his residential neighborhood to the golf course to track down the running boy, he gets into a wild area that features Australian pines, scrubby trees, and thickets. When he walks back into the wooded area, he comes to a ditch that runs "like a tunnel through the thicket."
The construction site has rough ground pitted by sandy owl burrows. When Roy goes with Mullet Fingers to where the running boy catches mullet fish with his bare hands, the boys sit with their "legs dangling over the pale green creek." Roy is mesmerized by the quiet isolation there, a place where "the bushy old mangroves [seal] off the place from the honking and hammering of civilization."
Roy's trip to the Everglades with his family is even more awe-inspiring. Roy is amazed by "the immense flatness of the terrain, the lush horizons, and the exotic abundance of life." Taking an airboat across the "sawgrass flats" and down the "narrow winding creeks," Roy comes to appreciate the beauty of Florida. In the Epilogue, when Roy goes to Beatrice's soccer game, the author describes the Florida sunshine which Roy has finally come to appreciate. The sun lights up the soccer field "like a neon carpet," and the "high sun and the steaming heat" draw Roy back to the creek where he had spent time with Mullet Fingers. Again he enjoys an afternoon at the creek bordered by a "gnarly old stump," "tangled trees," and "dense knotted mangroves" under the "sun's glare." As Roy becomes more accustomed to living in Florida, the descriptions of the setting become more interesting, varied, and pleasant.
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