Isolation, loneliness, and transience are key aspects of Katie’s experience in Ducks as well as the people around her. As Beaton notes in the Prologue, the only way for many people in her community to make a decent living is to move 2,000 miles west to Alberta, leaving behind family, friends, and support networks. The oil sands exist in a world apart from the workers’ hometowns, leaving them isolated and uprooted. In many instances, this transience makes men more likely to behave badly because they feel less connected and obligated to the people around them. Beaton experiences the effects of this loneliness herself, not just with her own lack of connections but also by the many instances of unwanted male attention, including sexual assault.

As a memoir, Ducks primarily focuses on Katie’s isolation, loneliness, and transience. First, she leaves her family for the other side of the country, and while working on the oil sands, she experiences long stretches of solitude. These are illustrated in panels that focus on the landscape with Katie a small speck in the drawing, or else in panels that focus on Katie to the exclusion of anything else around her. The common thread in many of her experiences is the sense of being alone, whether through physical separation from her peers or being alienated by men’s misogyny and rough way of interacting with each other.