What is the importance of the airport in the novel, When Ghosts Come Home?

The Brunswick County airport features in the novel as a crime scene, rather than a functioning place of business. It is the scene of the novel’s opening drama, and from then onwards proves a troublesome place, where Winston has to contend with a succession of challenges and irritations. The airport in Wilmington is small, and Colleen “couldn’t help but think of it as a miniature model of a real airport,” but it is bustling and sophisticated by comparison (104). The novel begins and ends with these airports: a plane landing unexpectedly in Oak Island, and failing to land in Wilmington when it is supposed to.