How Did "Demon Copperhead" by Barbara Kingsolver End? All of the Plot Twists and Spoilers!

 

How does "Demon Copperhead" by Barbara Kingsolver end? Have you finished reading "Demon Copperhead" and desperately need to discuss it? Or maybe you've read it, but can't remember how "Demon Copperhead" ends, or do you want to skip ahead to discover all the spoilers? Need a refresher on "Demon Copperhead" before heading off to book club tonight? Keep reading to discuss this coming-of-age novel and all the twists and turns at the end!

 

 

Spoilers ahead!

 

How Did "Demon Copperhead" by Barbara Kingsolver End?

What Are the Twists and Spoilers?

Demon starts drawing a cartoon for the local newspaper called "Redneck".

Demon doesn’t like the way his community has been portrayed in the other cartoons he has seen in the newspaper. At the same time, Dori and Demon are living together, and it’s rough. Dori is struggling to be alone, and Demon is determined to improve their position in life, but this frequently leads to conflict. Ms. Annie, the art teacher, tries to convince Demon to finish high school. Demon tells her that he isn’t a kid anymore - when did he really ever get the chance to be one- and he has stuff to take care of at home. Ms. Annie tells him that every teacher hopes to have a student like him. She tells Demon that she saw "Redneck" in the newspaper and tells him that she likes it.

Dori begins stealing from a “friend”

We start to see the darker side of living with Dori and her drug use. Dori begins stealing from Thelma. Thelma is a home health nurse Dori met while he father was sick. Thelma supplies Dori with morphine and employs her at a beauty parlor they opened together in Thelma's basement.

Ms. Annie negotiates a contract for Demon and "Redneck"

Ms. Annie pretends to be Demon's agent and calls the local newspaper. Initially, they only offered Demon $10 per comic strip. Demon goes to Ms. Annie and Mr. Armstrong's house for dinner. They talk about the comic strip and also encourage him to stop using drugs. They also discuss living with someone besides Dori, acknowledging that it is hard to quit when you live with an active user. Ms Annie gets Demon $50 per comic strip and a bonus if it gets syndicated. Demon ropes Tommy into helping him because he needs a steady hand and doesn’t want all of the pressure to perform.

What happened to Emmy?

Rose tells Demon that Fast Forward has been using Emmy as “bait”. Emmy has sex with potential clients to convince them to work with Fast Forward in a drug trade. Rose claims that Emmy is unrecognizable now and, as proof, hands Demon the snake bracelet he had given Emmy when they were kids. Demon tells June, Emmy's adoptive mom. June hopes to find Emmy in Atlanta.

Dori gets fired from her job as a hairdresser because Thelma caught her stealing.

Tommy and Demon continue to spend time together working at the newspaper, but Tommy asks Demon for space. Tommy is worried about Demon’s ability to function safely around the newspaper equipment - exacto knives, etc. Tommy suggests that Demon begin going to AA. Demon is furious with Tommy at the suggestion. Coincidentally, Tommy is living in the garage apartment of the McCobbs, his former foster parents. When Demon visits Tommy, he chats with the family who used to foster him. Mr. McCobb is in over his head with “UHaul,” according to Mrs. McCobb.

Maggot and Demon retrieve Martha.

They take her to June's house to try to find out where Emmy might be. When Demon gets back to Dori, she tells him that she’s pregnant.

Demon goes with June to retrieve Emmy in Atlanta and take her to rehab

June gets Emmy's new address in Atlanta from Martha. Demon, June, and her brother go to Atlanta and find Emmy. When Demon gets home from the trip, Dori is covered in blood from losing the baby, but she is too high to understand what is happening. Demon says goodbye to Emmy, who heads to rehab. Demon returns the snake bracelet to Emmy.

Angus calls Demon in a panic because she is in a situation with U-Haul.

Demon arrives and tackles U-Haul. Emmy grabs some papers and runs outside. They both get into U-Haul's car, and Angus explains that U-Haul had tried to blackmail her into sleeping with him. U-Haul threatens to blackmail Angus by telling the high school about her dad's drunkenness and claims her father was embezzling from the boosters at school. However, Angus found evidence that it was U-Haul who was doing the embezzlement all along. Mr. McCobb had called their house regarding the money U-Haul was investing in the McCobb's business, and that raised a red flag to Angus when she answered the call.

Dori overdoses and dies.

Demon also finds Dori's dog dead alongside her. At Dori's funeral, Angus helps Demon and talks with him about her plans with Coach to sober up. After Dori's death, Demon moved in with Maggot and Mrs. Peggot, where he continued to use drugs and worked on "Red Neck".

Fast Forward and Hammer die at Devil's Bathtub.

Demon runs into Rose, who is delivering pizzas. Rose invites Demon to come with her to see Fast Forward. On their way, Demon and Maggot run into Emmy’s former boyfriend, Hammer Kelly, who is stranded with a flat tire in a heavy rainstorm. Demon pulls over to help him. They end up abandoning the truck, and Hammer joins Demon and Maggot in their car. Before leaving the truck, however, Hammer grabs his rifle.

They all end up at Devil’s Bathtub, the body of water where Demon’s dad drowned before he was born. On the drive, both Demon and Hammer are furious with Fast Forward, Demon reflecting on his history with him, and Tommy back on the farm. Hammer, because he blames Fast Forward, rightfully, for the rough life that Emmy has been living.
When they arrive, Demon wonders if it was a setup by Rose to lure Demon to somewhere he didn’t want to be with Fast Forward. Meanwhile, it is a flash flood, and the water is raging at Devil's Bathtub.

They find Flash Forward dangerously high above the water on a cliff edge, where he begins trash-talking Emmy. Hammer loses it and aims to shoot. Another guy on the cliff alerts Flash, but this causes him to lose his balance. Fast Forward falls and tries to make it to the water, but hits his head on the rocks instead. Hammer goes to try to help him, saying he wasn’t going to shoot. Hammer drowns trying to get to Fast Foward.

Demon kicks Hammer's rifle into the water and waits for a water rescue team while Maggot and Fast Forward's friend call for help.

All of this is a callback to the beginning of the book when Demon is born “in caul” and the country myth that that means he’ll never drown.

Rose comes to the hospital and asks Demon how Fast Forward died.

Demon leaves out the part about the rifle and just says that Fast Forward fell because he was “spooked”. Rose makes it clear that it was a setup, but there was no clear plan because, well, everybody is on drugs. Rose claims that Demon will be charged with a felony for being an accessory to Hammer's death because he was involved in the drugs Hammer took. However, in that case, it would actually be Maggot who would be charged. Demon asks Rose to drop it, but she feels they should have to “pay” for Fast Forward's death.

Demon agrees to go to rehab.

After the traumatic events at Devil's Bathtub, June talks to Demon about going to rehab. The plan is to go to rehab and then to live at a halfway house. June insists that he needs to go away for at least a year. June talks about her time away and the opportunity to have an identity outside of their small community. Demon goes on a transformative walkabout-type drug-induced trip and then decides to go to rehab.

Three years pass with Demon in rehab and then living at the halfway house.

While Demon is in rehab, Maggot ends up going to a juvenile prison. When Maggot gets out after two years, he lives with his mom, who is also now out of jail. Three years pass with Demon out of town. While at rehab, Demon is friends with a man named Chartrain, also a former athlete and a war veteran who had lost his legs in Afghanistan. Gizmo, who headed to rehab after getting into a car accident that killed all but one of a family of five. And Viking, who is deaf due to his use of OxyContin.

Demon stays connected with Tommy through email.

Demon also befriends the local librarian, a woman named Lyra. Lyra helps him scan his "Red Neck" comics and also introduces him to graphic novels and the online world of comics. Tommy ends up meeting his longtime online girlfriend and marries her. Angus attends college at Vanderbilt in Nashville. Demon continues to post comics on the website Lyra helped him create, including a history of Tennessee. Afterwards, he is offered a book deal, and Annie and her husband, Mr. Armstrong, help him put together what is needed for the offer. For that, he returns home for the first time in years.

Demon returns home to Lee County.

While there, he ends up at the trail to Devil's Bathtub. Afterwards, he heads to June's to visit. There, he learns that Emmy moved into an apartment in Asheville with some other girls in recovery and also that Angus is doing well. Demon also visits his Grandmother and Mr. Dick.
While there, Demon learns more about Angus. Angus majored in psychology and plans to return for her master's to become a social worker. Demon asks whether Angus has a boyfriend, and his Grandmother tries to avoid the question but acknowledges that she has “one fellow in particular” in mind. It’s obvious to the reader that she means Demon; however, Demon assumes Angus has met someone in Nashville.

Demon visits with Coach

Coach has left his job and moved into an apartment. Coach had a farewell party the previous night that Demon did not go to. He would only have seen the former players who couldn’t be there because of drugs and drug-related accidents. We find out that UHaul managed to slither his way out of trouble for the embezzlement charges.

Demon and Angus begin a life together.

Demon heads to their old house to visit Angus, and she is packing up the house to sell it. She and Demon talk about their lives and the upcoming holidays. Angus expresses a desire to take him to the ocean- despite two failed attempts, he’s never seen it. They get in the car and drive off, and the novel "Demon Copperhead" ends with them on that drive, Demon one hand on the wheel and the other behind Angus. 

What other twists and turns were you surprised by reading "Demon Copperhead" by Barbara Kingsolver? Did you see the ending coming for each character, or were you surprised!? Did the book end how you had hoped? Comment down below and let me know!