Content Warning: This section of the guide describes and discusses the novel’s treatment of drug addiction and death by suicide.

Home Is Where the Bodies Are is replete with characters who don’t trust each other. This theme is explicitly foregrounded in the novel’s initial pages when Laura cautions Beth with her dying breath by saying, “Don’t trust...” (17). Since Laura expires before finishing the sentence, Beth can’t figure out who or what she shouldn’t trust. There is a certain irony in Laura directing this comment to Beth because the latter trusts no one anyway. Beth is suspicious of each of her family members because she has been repeatedly disappointed by them. Nicole’s drug addiction has driven a wedge between the sisters, and Michael’s absence makes Beth feel he is unreliable. Similarly, Beth no longer trusts her father after his disappearance. When Michael and Nicole want to go in search of him, Beth remains at home, saying, “Dad has disappointed me far too many times, and I can’t do it anymore” (146). The lack of trust in the Thomas family unit has left each sibling feeling isolated, unable to draw on each other for support.

Mistrust as a family trait extends back to Michael’s first murder, which shatters the familial bond.