Loyalty is often celebrated as a virtue. In Thomas Green’s The Island, it is shown as both a blessing and a curse. Characters grapple with who they serve, what they believe in, and what they’re willing to sacrifice.
Boris Nekrich’s loyalty to old comrades clashes with his new reality. Should he protect his
superiors, who once saved him from ruin, or betray them for a chance at freedom? His choices remind us that loyalty can imprison as much as it liberates.
Dean Thomas, on the other hand, wrestles with his loyalty to the CIA. His orders are clear, but the murky ethics of espionage leave him questioning whether loyalty to an institution justifies personal compromise.
Even secondary characters, from Japanese financiers to Georgian diplomats, face the same dilemma: remain loyal to a cause, or adapt to survive?
Through these struggles, The Island asks hard questions. Is loyalty noble when it blinds us? Is betrayal always a sin, or sometimes a necessity? The novel doesn’t provide easy answers—but it makes readers reconsider their own ideas about allegiance, both personal and political.
