Content Warning: The entries on Nailer and Richard contain references to violence and addiction.

Nailer is the protagonist of Ship Breaker. The novel’s third-person limited point of view enables Nailer’s perspective to dominate throughout the narrative, though Bacigalupi characterizes Nailer primarily through indirect characterization—his thoughts and actions, as well as what other characters say about him. He is 15 years old, small, and who works scavenging wire in the dangerous ducts of wrecked oil tankers. While his size makes him a valuable member of the light crew, it is his quickness and ability to make quota every day that help him to keep his job. He lives with his father, who is violent and has an addiction to drugs, in a beach shack; his mother died years before. Nailer’s best friend, Pima, is his crew boss, and her mother, Sadna, is a mother-figure for him; she patches him up and provides him with a safe haven when he needs to escape his father’s physical abuse.

Until he falls through a service passage to a deep pool of oil and nearly drowns, Nailer only dreams of a life beyond the hardships of ship breaking.