In this excerpt, Stratton uses foreshadowing to develop the novel’s underlying theme of death via the widely spread disease… HIV/AIDS. Stratton uses Jonah’s situation to demonstrate to the reader an instance of how the disease would spread in households rapidly. Jonah has slept with many other women other than Chanda’s mother, Lillian. Since these women work s prostitutes they have most likely slept with other men. Therefore, they have caught the disease and dispersed it to other people. Jonah has caught it from someone, passed it on to Lilian, and all their babies have died from that incident. It is foreshadowed that Chanda’s mom’s sickness and tiredness is all because of her having caught the disease rather than on account of Sara’s death,