Hoffman uses colors throughout the novel to vividly describe the lush island landscape, as well as to symbolize emotion. In particular, blue often represents grief, and green represents bitterness. Often, blue is associated with Jestine, whose life is defined by loss, while green is associated with Rachel, whose life is defined by resentment. Just as St. Thomas is literally awash in a combination of these colors—“a small speck of land, little more than thirty square miles set in the blue-green sea” (3)—so  too are Rachel and Jestine figuratively swimming in colors, isolated by their feelings of grief and bitterness.

Green is first connected to the Pomié family apple tree and its bitter fruit. The apple tree, which could produce delicious sweet fruit in a cool climate, instead produces inedible green apples in the St. Thomas heat. The apple tree symbolizes Rachel, who resents being trapped on the island. Rachel herself points out this color symbolism after a disagreement with her mother: “I didn’t understand that when I closed myself to her, I took a part of her bitterness inside me. It was green and unforgiving, and as it grew it made me more like her” (7).