Is Dewey Dell actually pregnant? As Dewey Dell is immature and ignored by most around her, she has a certain lack of common sense. Even at the time of the novel, it would be common for a girl to miss her period and mistake it for pregnancy, due to poor nutritional standards. Dewey Dell has also grown up poor on a farm. Indeed, Dewey Dell has shown no symptoms of pregnancy in the text, such as morning sickness or her stomach growing. note Admittedly, she'd probably not have known that those would be pregnancy symptoms or what pregnancy symptoms are.
Jewel is either the outsider of the family due to being a Jerk with a Heart of Gold, or a Spoiled Brat and a Jerkass because he knows that his father is not Anse.
Darl either has good morals or he is a Jerkass who doesn't own up to his mistakes.
Anse is either a good father or a lazy bum who uses religion to justify not having to work.
Anse either treats Jewel bad because he won't conform to him or because he knows Jewel's status as a Heroic Bastard and a symbol of Addie's affair.
Funny Moments: The pharmacy owner hitting on an oblivious Dewey Dell is definitely this... until he rapes her.
Squick: Where do you start? Vardaman drills a hole through his mother's corpse's face. Said corpse grows progressively more rotten, as does Cash's poorly-treated broken leg.
Continuing the band with Tim has been divisive. Supporters believe in giving people a second chance, that people can truly change for the better, while detractors believe in the "once a scumbag, always a scumbag" principle. Tim himself even noted this, as he acknowledges that some aren't ready to forgive him anytime soon.
Josh Gilbert's departure was also incredibly divisive, as many fans felt that his clean vocals and songwriting and production contributions were very important to the band's sound.
Fandom Rivalry: With Spiritbox, due to Josh joining them pretty much immediately after quitting As I Lay Dying. A lot of As I Lay Dying's fans were very upset with him over it. This is a fairly one-sided rivalry, as the majority of Spiritbox's fans don't seem to care about Josh's past.
Growing the Beard: An Ocean Between Us is generally regarded as the point where the band's music became more impressive on a melodic and heavier level.
Overshadowed by Controversy: Tim Lambesis's arrest and conviction for attempting to put a hit out on his wife has left a huge black mark on the band's reputation, to say the least. He is acutely aware of this fact, and has made a sincere effort to redeem himself and help make people's lives better.
For what it's worth, Nick and Josh have since managed to shed the controversy they had been lumped in with since they both departed the band. Both of them have since got involved in new projects (Nick in Mire and Josh in Spiritbox), and Josh has been steadily gaining a good reputation as a producer and songwriter in the music industry.
Signature Song: "Forever", "Nothing Left/The Sound of Truth", "Confined", or "Parallels".
Tainted by the Preview: When it was revealed that the pre-jail time line-up would be back with Lambesis as the vocalist, there was a lot of debate as to whether having him back was a good idea.
Wangst: Some of their lyrics can stray into this, particularly on their earlier works. This has led some metalheads to give them the derisive nickname "As I Lay Crying".
Win Back the Crowd: "My Own Grave" (and really the entirety of the Shaped By Fire album) was more or less an apology, with the lyrics written from the perspective of Tim being The Atoner.
