Salvage the Bones is a 2011 novel by Jesmyn Ward and was the 2011 recipient of the National Book Award for Fiction. The novel explores the plight of a working class African American family in Mississippi as they prepare for Katrina and follows them through the aftermaths of the storm. Ward, who had lived through the Katrina, wrote the novel, after being very "dissatisifed with the way [Katrina] had receded from public consciousness". In an interview with the Paris Review, Ward said she drew inspiration from, Medea and the works of Faulkner.