Not Because of the Revolution

         Persepolis is one of the most unique books I have ever read. On one hand it is about the Iranian revolution of 1979 and the years following it. The effects it had on the Iranian population and philosophy. On the other hand it is about a girl named Marjane Satrapi and her coming of age. When you connect these two story lines it makes for an extremely interesting book containing both accurate and informative historical content, and smart, funny details about growing up as a teenage girl in pre and post-revolution Iran. However, it is often hard to differentiate between whether Marji's actions are caused by the hard times she is growing up in, or by her own person, independent of whatever outside events are occurring. One of the topics our book club focused on was how her personal philosophy and, therefore, actions were affected by her environment and whether they are therefore excusable. I think that Marji's actions are affected by her upbringing in the times of revolution rather than the effects of the revolution itself and therefore she is responsible for them.
        The revolution of Iran left many families without family members, killed in riots and tortured for being communist thinkers. It left many bereft of money or jobs after organizations were labeled bourgeois or "western." Many imprisoned young women were raped as it was against the law to kill a virgin. Compared to there occurrences, Marji's family was virtually untouched by both the Shah or the revolutionary regime. Her father kept his high level job and continued to make money to support the family while they hosted illegal parties. They were not effected by the government and flaunted their excess without regard to how it might effect their neighbors or any other non-related party. Following her self righteous parents, Marji was taught to express herself no matter the consequences and be independent of propaganda and authority while being fully immersed and enamored of revolutions of all kinds. This upbringing led Marji to get expelled from two schools and marry a man that she knew she did not truly love, all events that many shrugged off due to how she "suffered" under the revolution and regime but I believe are due to her upbringing.
         Marji was expelled from two schools due to her confrontational actions, actions that both adults in the story and my fellow book club dismissed as being ok because "she went through tough times." However, Marji's problems stemmed from trouble with accepting authority figures due to the fact that she turned everything into her own personal revolution. Marji's parents bought her many books on the topic to "educate her." She then became a revolutionary fanatic at the age of 8, dressing like Che Guevara and attempting to start a class revolution by helping her maid have a forbidden affair. These events, coupled with her parent's encouragement and avid revolutionary support, led Marji to believe that she should change everything she thought was wrong with no regard to authority: causing her to be expelled twice.
         One other questionable action that Marji committed that many excuse as brainwashing by the society she grew up was marrying a man that she did not love, and realized this on a subconscious level. While many dismiss this as an affect of the revolution and the pressure society put on her, I believe that it was another affect of her upbringing. Marji's marriage was more a rebellion against her past than a reflection of it. Marji had been raised and accustomed to despise marriage as it was stressed by the regime. By marrying Reza, she was going against what had led her almost to death, as a contradiction on herself.
           Persepolis exemplifies the difficulty in growing up in an ever changing world and how it effects impressionable young adults, but I believe that neither the regime or the revolution led Marjane to her bad decisions but her upbringing and attitude thereof.

The Bind

  What binds us to our siblings? To our parents? We grow up with these people: confine ourselves in a house with them, we love them unconditionally. And why? Is it a habit of accustom? Studies have shown that certain phermones and smells emitted by parents bond them to their children, but beyond science there is an unjustifiable bond in family, something so hard to break that even when your family is as scattered as your monster addicted mother's brain after a line, they affect you deeply and irrevocably.
                I just finished reading the book Fallout by Ellen Hopkins. I've read her other books and skimmed through this one, but had not read it in full. Curious to see what happened to Kristina, I picked up the lyrical third book in her much vaunted  series and found that this book follows the lives of her three oldest children. I left Kristina when she was 19, with a one year old child and pregnant with a baby girl. Hunter, her eldest child, lived with her parents at the time. Kristina is going to jail and is at a loss of what to do and Hopkins picks up the story with Hunter, now almost 19.
                 Hunter is struggling with his relationship with his girlfriend, Nikki, and smokes pot (though is not really addicted). He doesn't know who his father is because his grandparents thought it best to not tell that he was a product of rape.

Hopkins then switches to Autumn, Kristina's second oldest child. Autumn has OCD and is living with her paternal grandpa (Trey, Kristina's former boyfriend's, boyfriend's father) and her aunt. Autumn lives a sheltered life, until she meets Bryce. Bryce is her first love, her first sex and her first date all rolled into one.

Finally there is Summer. Summer is living in foster care and has had a tough time. At 12 she was raped by one of her foster parents and has been moved from town to town ever since: a product of one of America's most inept systems. Summer has a boyfriend named Matt but is in love with his best friend, Kyle.*

One thing stood out to me in the book. It is a line from a poem from Summer (about Autumn):

"On the surface she is nothing like me.

But just below the skin,

we find a connection. I shudder

to think why that might be, because

our common denominator is

someone I don't want to resemble."

This line makes me think about what it must be like for the characters, to have a connection to someone which you don't want to have: to have a family you don't want to discover. However, somehow, I feel that these characters are who they are because of this connection. As I stated before, the bond that tethers them to each other is a part of who they are, something that is irrevocable.
                 Take Hunter for example, he feels lonely and left behind by his mother "spinning in a whirlwind of her dust". He craves affection from his girlfriend but it isn't enough. He cheats on her with groupies when she isn't enough. I think that he is searching for someone to fill the hole Kristina created. Because no matter what mother figure in his life tries to fill his hole, she is still not his mother.

Another example of this is Autumn. Autumn has OCD and, although she doesn't say it, she blames it partly on her mother. After all, Kristina was the one who dumped her with her boyfriend's father and never looked back. Autumn has grown up under her Grandpa's micro management and her Aunt's love. Autumn has such a dysfunctional family that she feels that everything else that can be perfect should be. Kristina was the one who left her here, so it's Kristina's fault.

Finally there is Summer. Summer, who has had the worst life of all. Summer, who knows a lot about her past but nothing about her future. Summer, who sees her mother sometimes and always ends up yelling at her. Behind the yelling, though, I see need. Need for stability in her life, need for someone to love her. Maybe this is why she runs away with Kyle. Kyle loves her, or does he? Will Summer get hurt even more? But most of all a Summer who needs a future so badly that she runs so far away that she almost dies. Summer wants to forget so much about the past that she is willing to do anything for the future.

However, though Kristina wrecks havoc through their lives, there is some of Kristina in each of them, whether they know it or not, that unalterable bind that will remain a part of them forever.

*Kristina has two other children who live with her and her boyfriend Ron.

The Real Help

              Recently I re-read the book, "The Help." Made into a major motion picture a year or so ago, "The Help" has become a favored book club read and important book for showing civil rights issues in the mainstream media on the surface, and at first I agreed with that. However, when I re-read the book and looked at some articles on the book, I noticed something different about the book, that it may not be the civil rights darling that I thought it.
               The problem, I and many others, found with the book was that although it was proclaimed to be about black maids in the conservative south essentially liberating themselves and show their strength and bravery, the book only showed that this could happen if a white person stepped in to help. Aibeleen doesn't give any serious thought to changing her life or standing up for herself until Skeeter (a white lady) comes in with the idea for a book exposing the treatment of maids in Jackson, Mississippi. The book shows the struggle for civil rights as being brought about by a white lady, and implies exactly the opposite of the civil rights movement: that african americans cannot help themselves to justice.
              This disconcerted me as the media had marketed as something totally different, and everyone from the Oscar's to the "New York Times" had heralded it as an important book. It made me think about the media today, it doesn't seem to look very deeply into what it is telling us. Based on a lot of what I've read, the media doesn't make you think, it makes you think about what it wants you to think. And this, I believe, is wrong.

The True Want for Happiness

            I just finished the book "The Lady in the Car with the Glasses and a Gun." The book, while somewhat stodgy at first, turned into a delicious thriller with twists and turns so sudden that it was almost impossible to see them coming and an ending that both satiated and hungry the reader. When I last left Dany Longo she had been mysteriously attacked, but that was all that was wrong. But we learn that was only a chip of the iceberg that was her problems on the journey. It seems that wherever Dany goes, people believe they have seen her before, that she has already visited all of the places she's been: the gas station, the Renaissance hotel: the beach: even the cafe she stopped to get an espresso at. But that's not all, Dany opens the trunk to find a dead body of a notorious womanizer of Paris wrapped in a rug and deposited with a gun. Dany attempts to solve the mystery of the man's murder and her apparent escapades about France. When she stumbles upon the answer, her boss attempts to kill her and it is revealed that is was he and his wife who killed the man and attempted to pin it on Dany, so convincingly that Dany believes she did it. Dany hears his story, leaves and gets married to a man in England.
                 The ending seemed strange to me, after all of Dany's adventures, her mental instability and mania: her constant desire to be on her own, how could she just settle down and marry someone? How could her weekend of paranoia and thrills not affect her? But then I realized that the trip was what Dany needed to move on from her "just there" state of being perennially worried for no reason. The trip's insanity was the climax of her madness, the thing that pushed her to the edge. If she had submitted to the mystery and accepted her apparent guilt for the murder and hide the body away, she never would have moved on from the horrible monotony her life held before. By solving the mystery she took an active role against being the victim of circumstance as she had before (her parents death, her lack of funds, her lack of love) and her life turned out much differently. This led her to happiness in the end, as she passed the test of being passive and lacking any zeal for life (as she had been) or being actively involved in her life, not just accepting what was given.
               To conclude, in order for Dany to settle down, and be seemingly "normal." She had to confront the thing about herself that was holding herself back in a finite and important way. She was tested on whether she truly wanted to be happy and, passing this, got everything she wanted.

Symbolism in "The Lady in the Car with the Glasses and a Gun"

           Currently I am halfway through the tantalizing yet somehow dreary book that is, "The Lady in the Car with the Glasses and a Gun." The book takes place sometime in the mid 1900s, in France. The book begins in Paris France, and follows "The Lady" or Dany Longo, as she travels around France on the verge of a psychotic breakdown in a car borrowed from her boss. The book begins with Dany emerging from a state of unconsciousness in a gas station bathroom after being attacked. However, the only thing the attacker did to her was break her hand, her money is all there and nothing else has been damaged. We are then taken to the days preceding her attack and focus in on the day it happened, showing us the circumstances of her ordeal.
             The book is rife with symbolism, its title in itself states the books three biggest symbols. Number one, the car. The car is a symbol of Dany's weakness for luxury and the downfall that is in her longing for more than what is given to her. When Dany lived at the orphanage, being able to drive MOther "Supe" Superior around in the car is what gave her a little bit of freedom, a little bit of pleasure that was not found in her everyday life. THe car she has borrowed from the boss fits this perfectly, the luxury car she is temporarily allowed to have, but leads her to break the rules of the loan and keep the car for longer. In other words, her love for the things above her station is what leads her to her downfall.
              Number two, the glasses. Dany wears darkened prescription glasses at all times, she believes they protect her from the world. To me, they symbolize both her inverted-ness,  her painful shyness and the subtle narcism that comes from such an inverted state of being. The idea that she is mysterious that she is inapproachable is selfish in that she is just trying to get out of the difficult situations that occur when she tries to be social. She would rather withdraw from all humans and pretend to be mysterious and aloof than face the pain that comes from interacting with people. The glasses symbolize how selfish yet helpless she really is. It is these weaknesses, symbolized by the Car and the Glasses that lead her to her attack.
              As I am only halfway through the book, I have not gotten to the section devoted to the Gun, and I don't think that the Lady symbolizes anything but Dany herself. However, there were two other symbols for parts of Dany's life that led her to the attack that I noticed.
               One of these was the Pink Elephant that was on her desk, lined up with all of her typing supplies. It symbolizes Dany's childhood. When he proposes the job offer to Dany, her boss moves the elephant from the line. This symbolizes him giving her an opportunity to move on from her childlike existence and become a more mature adult. He is giving her an opportunity to prove herself. Dany at first moves it back and refuses the job, but then realizes that she should take it as it means more money and takes it with her to give to his daughter. She is ready to pass it along and let go of her childhood. However, Dany forgets it and does not get to give it to the little girl. This symbolizes that she can't let go of her childhood just yet and her infantile behavior leads her into the trouble she is now facing.
                The last important symbol I noticed in "The Lady in the Car with the Glasses and a Gun" is the symbolism of the white suit. The white suit symbolizes Dany's hope for the future: her good intentions and her remaining innocence. Like the car it is luxe, but also sensible, which refutes the fault in it. However, the suit gets progressively ruined over the course of the book, showing that Dany's hopes will be dashed and that her intentions will not lead to good results. And that, like the idea of keeping a white suit clean over a journey, her hopes are unrealistic.
                 To conclude, there is much symbolism in the book "The Lady in the Car with the Glasses and a Gun," and it makes for an interesting story if you are willing to look deeply enough.
           

The Ones Who Built the Fire

            Today I decided to take yet another trip down memory lane and revisit the girl who was on fire, who is still on fire in the minds of some. Yes, you know who I'm talking about, Katniss Everdeen.

            You've all heard of Katniss Everdeen. She's the girl who survived the hunger games. Twice. She the subject of the love of two desirable guys. She is a deadly weapon disguised as a human girl. She is confused, she is hurt. She is lovesick and furious, dangerous and sad. She hates humanity, she loves it. She is a turmoil of emotions. She confides in no one. Not even her parents. family. When you read this your mind probably flashed to your own. Annoying dad, patronizing mom, we all know the story. However, you probably have memories of hugs, words whispered to you at the dead of night when you are scared of the dark. Kisses dropped on your skinned knee. Parents are meant to love you. You can confide in your parents, and hopefully they will help you. However, Katniss, who has been through so much, doesn't confide in her parents. Rereading the Hunger Games, I looked closer into the dynamics of Katniss' relationship with her parents, the ones who built the fire that would become a powerful inferno.

        First, I looked at Katniss' mother. The book never mentions her name, is this a reference to how removed she is from Katniss' life? Well, she certainly is removed, ever since Katniss' mother fell into depression, Katniss is filled with mistrust for her mom. I think that Katniss and her mother should have worked harder to rebuild their relationship. Though no one could fathom that Katniss would have to compete in the Hunger Games, life in district 12 is tough, and a 16 year old girl needs someone to confide in. I think that things could have worked out better for Katniss if she and her mother confided in each other. If Katniss had talked to someone about her tepid relationship with Gale, maybe she would have felt less guilty about kissing Peeta. If Katniss had talked with her mother during the time she spent in district thirteen, maybe she would have been more mentally stable. And if she and her mom had had a better relationship, she might of had someone to support her when Prim died. Instead, Katniss began a descent into madness. Everyone knows that mothers baby you sometimes. Katniss was never babied. She always had to be mature and responsible, way beyond her years. Katniss was resentful of this, it turned her into the hardened killer who won the 74th Hunger games. And as she has said many times, "no decent person ever wins the games."

          Then there's Katniss' father. The one who died when Katniss was 11. If Katniss' father was alive, then the story might not have happened. Mr.Everdeen would have been the main hunter for the Evergreens and Katniss would not have to shoulder that responsibility. Mr. Everdeen would have put food on the table and cared for his daughters. If Katniss' dad was still alive, Katniss' mother would've never fallen into depression, causing Katniss and her mother to still get along. Katniss loved her father, he would have counseled her to the best decisions, and she would have felt safe. On the other hand if Katniss' father lived, she wouldn't have had all of the opportunities to practice hunting, as he would have been the main hunter. Also, Katniss wouldn't have become so hard and invincible. She wouldn't have been the vicious killer who won the games.

            There's no denying that parents are annoying, but they give you more help than you give them credit for. Supporting parents can help so much in a time of need. If Katniss had had a different parental situation, her life would be so much different. Katniss needs her parents, she just doesn't know it. And even though Katniss thinks she has more romantic love than she needs, she needs some parental love too.

The Blind Spot

               Recently I have started reading "1984" by George Orwell. The book is set in 1984, but an imagined one. Orwell wrote the book in the 1940s, so it is an imagined chronology of 1984. And what a different 1984 it is! Orwell writes of a supremest regime ruled by Big Brother, a tyrannical leader who is both worshipped and feared by all. To instill this fear and monitor the devotion Big Brother has installed devices in all houses that can record movement and hear audio that are almost like television. He has set up a vast government with communist-like coupons for food and clothing divided equally. The country (The novel takes place in London) is almost always at war with one country or the other and a new shorter language (Newspeak) is slowly leeching the English language of its adjectives and adverbs. The  book focuses on Winston Smith who works in the Ministry of "Truth," erasing all of Big Brothers false speeches and predictions and making them correct. However, Smith secretly writes in a diary about Big Brother's regime and his stifled hatred of the regime in a spot blind to the monitor, a deed easily punishable by death. It is the former sentence, I believe, that causes the latter.
            I think that the reason Smith is so different than his Big Brother fearing peers is his very job. Unlike Smith's friend, Syme, who diligently and enthusiastically purges English and replaces it with Newspeak, Smith's job is not to improve upon the regime or add to it, it is to erase its mistakes and clean up after it. Smith is constantly being exposed to Big Brother's mistakes and the very proof of his vulnerability.
           Big Brother has worked very hard at establishing himself as almost a God, the almighty power that can see everything you're doing. And the devotion that "God" inspires in his followers is almost matched by Big Brother's "subjects." However, this image is marred by the fact that he is still human and does make mistakes such as predicting an over-production of goods when there was actually a loss. And since Smith is the one who actually realizes that Big Brother makes these mistakes, he can never see Big Brother as his other comrades do. It is this realization that prods Smith to hate Big Brother, which comes from seeing who he actually is, not some propaganda-ed hero.
            This proves one of the most timeless causes of revolution, which I believe the book is leading to, information. When information is present, people can interpret it for themselves without someone else telling them what to think of it. Information helps people think for themselves and back up their suspicions and opinions. This is why Smith has the capacity to hate Big Brother, he has the information to do so. This is the regime's blind spot.

The Death Issue

              Once upon a time, I attempted to write a novel. I bought a leather-bound maroon book with gold trim and lined paper and told myself I would scribe until the end of the volume and publish it (in the process becoming rich and famous and getting a dog). I was six. Needless to say I did not make it to the end of that book. In fact I only finished about 20 pages in my huge first grade block letters. The book was about two friends who grew apart, but got back together  due to an elaborate plan and some minor animal kidnapping. The girls, named Anika and Sophie, were my dream alter-egos. They had their own rooms, pets and had delicious things like mac and cheese for dinner, and whipped cream and waffles for breakfast. They were talented (Sophie was a dancer, Anika drew), smart, pretty, basically perfect in every way. But that's what happens in the idyllic world of children's books, everything works out and everyone is special. Its so different from the YA books of today with their death, rape and social destruction-al themes. And transitioning between the happiness of early picture books to the disparaging works that fill my current shelves was one of the most eye-opening moments of my life.
                    Death becomes more integrated into the books we read as we get older, no longer just belonging to sickly animals or ancient grandparents. As death extends its dark reach to our teenage heroes and heroines, we wonder just how vulnerable we are. John Green informs us about cancer, Laurie Halse Anderson tells us about bulimia, Ellen Hopkins opens up our world to drugs. To the closeted reader that I am, books are a way to soak up the impossible and the all to possible. Books are the doorways and manuals to things I have yet to experience, and death is such a huge part of that.
                Where do we go? So many volumes have tried to address this inevitability. What religion doesn't tell us, stories make up, or sometimes refute the teachings of old. Heaven. Hell. What is even the difference? Elsewhere, a charming yet borderline creepy book, tells us we will be reborn as young children, perhaps addressing the degradation of our society and of ourselves. The Golden Compass, or to be more specific the Amber Spyglass, speaks of the dead, shadows in a barren land. The idea of this anomaly troubles me, for although when we were little death was a peaceful slumber, I now know the unknown lays beyond.
                 How will we die? Of course we don't know now, how would life work if we just counted the hours we had left in this world? Books have addressed this issue and more. But back to the question. The Hunger Games teaches us about our inner savages, waiting for the right venue to explode, the potential for violent ends in all of us. The Fault in Our Stars tells us of a different kind, a languishing death, so poignantly slow and painful that it almost hurts to read. Conrad sought suicide in Impulse and found "eternal rest." And others still teach us about the sudden death that occurs via car or crashing wave, unbeknownst until its too late. These different means expose us to both the horrors surrounding us and those within. All waiting until something falls into place and we vacate this world.
              So death surrounds us, and books have taught us that. Exposing some to that which was not imaginable and warning others about their paths. Innocent childhoods stolen by death, lust, greed. They're gone. For me it was books that took away my innocence and opened so many doors. And to think people say that teenagers feel like they're invincible; I feel closer to the grave than ever.

Paternal Ramifications

           Over spring break, as any teen with my ardor for the written word would do, I read many books. As my friends had scattered to various parts of the world to sojourn in various hotels and houses, I simply lay in my bed and devoured every book available online for free and the books my mother brought me from the library, as well as some old favorites. Among these volumes were the "Pretty Little Liars" series and "Looking for Alaska."
           As anyone who has read these books can tell, they are very different from each other. So dissimilar that it would seem fairly impossible to imply that they had any significant similarities other than they are all about teenagers. The former is about a group of wealthy teenagers living in suburban Philedelphia finding themselves and building their friendships and relationship amid the ongoing murder investigation of their best friend and threatening notes from the mysterious "A." The latter, "Looking for Alaska," is about a teenage boy named Miles finding "the great perhaps" in a Alabama boarding school aided by the Colonel (a brilliant scholarship student with a penchant for planning), Lara, Takumi and Alaska Young ( a sad, clever and beautiful girl searching for her way out of the "labyrinth" after the death of her mother).  One thing that stood out to me with all of these books is the effect of a father figure to the main characters.
           The paternal figure is often thought of as a mentor to boys, but they have an equal impact on their daughters. For example, in the "Pretty Little Liars" series, protagonist Hanna is prodded back into her eating disorder due to her father's new step daughter who "wears a size two!" Hanna even expresses this to her dad, saying, that she is "like a size two...I'm huge!" This is even though Hanna is thought to be thin by her peers. Her father does not respond, furthering her self esteem issues and pushing her deep into a cycle of bulimia and bad relationships. Another girl in the series pushed into bad relationships by her fathers actions is another protagonist Aria Montgomery. After Aria saw her Dad cheating on her Mom, he made her promise not to tell, which she kept for almost three years. When the clandestine affair goes public, Aria gets romantically involved with a teacher, saying, "I was vulnerable and he was there." Her fathers pressuring and extra-marital affairs got her into trouble, her boyfriend arrested and herself alienated.
              In "Looking for Alaska" the protagonist is named Miles, but the subject of the book is (arguably) Alaska Young. Miles is smitten and describes her as effortlessly beautiful, charismatic, intense, charismatic and troubled. Not the archetypal beautiful girl, but definitely worth obsessing over, in his opinion. Alaska's impulsiveness evidenced by her sudden desires to kiss or drive recklessly, is revealed to be caused by her believed causation of her mother's death. Her father reportedly blames her for her mother's demise and she lives with this imposed guilt everyday. It is also this guilt, I believe, that makes Alaska eventually die as she speeds towards her mother's grave after she forgot the anniversary of the death. If her father had made a connection with her after her mothers's death or attempted to remedy his accusations of fault made years ago, Alaska may not have felt such pressure to get to the grave and die.
             I have a relatively healthy relationship with my father. Because my parents are divorced, I get to see him more often one on one and, I believe, get to know him a little better than my friends and their fathers whose parents are still together. However, what someone's relationship with their father is supposed to be is hard to define. What anyones relationship with anyone else is supposed to be is also unclear. Should there be such definitions, such boundaries? How close is too close and how far is to far? These are questions that must be answered on a case by case basis, for as seen in these books, fathers definitely affect so much more than just their children.

The Weakness of the Inner Sanctum

              I recently finished reading the book "Picture Perfect" by Jodi Picoult. It was the first of her novel that I have read that was not a murder mystery. This reeled me in because the aspect that I usually find most appealing about her books is the fact that she integrates the technicalities of a murder trial with the heart wrenching backstory. Putting in stark contrast the emotional bloody throbbing of human nature with the cold, measured precision of courtroom proceedings. When picking up the book, I expected it to be derivative of these earlier books, but it was extremely different.
            "Picture Perfect" follows the tale of Cassie Barret. Or should I say, Cassie Rivers. Cassie is intelligent, mildly attractive, sensible and quiet in mien but what sets her apart from most women is that she is married to the most famous movie star in the United States, Alex Rivers. This is not to say that they have a perfect life. Oh no, Cassie is haunted by dreams of her childhood best friend, whom she watched die and her alcoholic mother, while Alex still cannot separate himself from the boy whose father forced him to "be a man" by spending days in snake infested bayous and earning bruises in New Orleans. In fact, the reason that Alex became an actor, as Picoult basically tells us, is to escape the person who he has become. That he does not know how to be someone decent, and this tortures him. Tortures him so much, in fact, that it leads him to brutally beat Cassie for something as benign as leaving his sneakers (of which he has many pairs as he is a star of epic proportions) outside. Cassie "escapes" by running away with her new friend (and possibly romantic interest?) Will Flying Horse to his families' reservation in South Dakota. But eventually returns to Alex, only to "leave him for good."
                If you could not tell by the tone of my summary, the book disgusted me. Its not to say that JOdi Picoult's books are the epitome of valid and layered adult fiction, but she is better than the trash I found myself reading. For one, Cassie and Alex's love story was not believable. They "got married six weeks after {they} met," and Cassie became totally integrated into his life as a movie star. They had the perfect wedding in Tanzania with all movie star trappings and moved back to Alex's mansion. There were no minute details to make it believable or even plausible. And even while I cringed at Cassie's beatings, it repulsed me how spineless she was, how SHE apologized to this man who broke her ribs for breaking a glass. How even after moving away for six months, she still returned to his side, a shadow that moved with him wherever he went. She continued to shape her form around his needs, becoming more of him than of her. I tried to understand  by comparing it to an addiction, you have to never have another drink of snort again to be completely clean, you can't let yourself slip up like Cassie did.
              But I guess I don't understand love, I can't fathom any emotion that would make Cassie come back; any gift. How can Cassie still call Alex her love? her other half? One can never fully trust someone again after they have damaged you so completely. There is an irrevocable difference between what has come before, and what life will proceed as. Cassie is spineless, and she has dug her own grave. By refusing to get out of her abusive entanglement with Alex she has sacrificed herself, her innermost sanctum to his wills and promises. And while her neck is "hung with a necklace of purple bruises" what is most violated is her soul.

Elementary My Dear Watson

                   As a wise woman once said, "life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you might get." I guess the same goes for books because I did not figure on reading half of the things that I do. For example, today I began reading A Study In Scarlet by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. Or a you plebeians might understand, a Sherlock Holmes book. This is the first Sherlock Holmes book both in chronology and in my reading life. My parents have always tried to get me to read the Sherlock Holmes series, indeed my mom pre-downloaded  A Study In Scarlet to my birthday present, a kindle (on which to read Sherlock Holmes, presumably). I put off the reading as long as I could but was accosted by the awful fate of having nothing to read except for the dreaded book. However, as I said before, "you never know what you might get" because I LOVED it. The book was witty, challenging to read, introduced me to new vocabulary and the story was fascinating. I was worried about many things that classics are prone to include, such as flowery paragraph-long descriptions of a chair and other equally non-central objects, slow paced plot lines and overly cautious and wordy dialogue that holds a challenge for the impatient mind of a teenager. However the descriptions were brief and succinct, the plot line was fast paced with the murderer found in around 100 pages, and the dialogue exciting and short. To speak briefly, it was a surprise that the book was enjoyable.
                     Not only was it enjoyable, it was also relatable. The book is told from the perspective of Dr. Watson, a seemingly staid man who finds adventure with the insane Sherlock Holmes and begins to escape from his mundane and painful life as a listless army casualty of the Afgan war. They meet on a quest for a house and end up roommates of sorts. The story between the two friends is relatable, as no one that I know solves murders in 1800s London. Sherlock Holmes is the crazy friend who is always niggling you into doing outlandish things and often embarrassing yourself in public, but he always gets you out unscathed and ready for the next adventure. I have friends like that, and to some people I am that friend. All the Sherlock Holmes of the world do is get you out of your comfort zone. And at the end of the day you've had fun in their crazy carefree whirlwind of a life. However, the fact that they can all of this and survive while you worry yourself with the repercussions is sometimes annoying, as Watson complains about cleaning up Holmes' messes. So the book was also relatable making it an easier way.
                     The friendship between Watson and Holmes was not just relatable, but a key factor in this first book. Conan Doyle is setting up the two companions for a long haul in the books to come, so establishing their friendship was one of the main purposes of this first book, I infer. Murder is a messy business and trust is key to any working relationship. There's a reason people synchronize watches, its to be on the same page, and that's what needs to happen with Watson and Holmes. So Doyle establishes their friendship subtly, as real friendships are made as well. First it starts with accepting the friendship, this happens when Watson sticks with Holmes when the crime is discovered. Watson has been at war, he has seen horrible things and doesn't need to be around more killing, but he sticks by Holmes, showing that he knows that Holmes needs him as much as vice versa. The second point is when Watson backs Holmes up with a gun, again the war has traumatized Watson but he is willing to look past that and roll with the adventure. I can see their friendship growing stronger throughout the books.
                      All in all, sir Arthur Conan Doyle has created a timeless masterpiece of fiction that I'm so glad that I read. Both the lack of values that I dislike in classic and the relatable budding friendship between Watson and Holmes make it exciting. Bring me the next one!

Collateral

                 When I was eight years old, I got sent to a different world. My mom kissed my cheek, told me I was going to be fine and left me in front of the door. This gateway, portal sucked me in with the spoken words, "Shalom Rachel!" And so began what I felt like was a dual life. It didn't matter that this world was across the street from my school or that it physically existed on planet Earth, in Park Slope, Brooklyn NY. I seemed to leave Zoe Fruchter behind whenever i transversed the boundary that seemed to surround PSJC, my other world. The temple (PSJC) made me feel small, the sheer weight of religion and tradition bore down on my eight-year-old shoulders like a yolk. I had a different name, Rachel, a different family, Yonina, Yakov and Leah and different friends and teachers. The food was different, kosher, the customs were different, even the alphabet was different. In my other world I was Zoe Fruchter, daughter of Lev and Jill sister of Ella. In my other world I was smart, in this one I could not read or write. In my other world I had friends, I was outgoing and I prospered like a flower bathed in sun synthesizing all information and experiences, with all of the materials I needed. Here I was minuscule, unimportant, an outsider who nibbled on fake Oreos in the bathroom because there was no one to play with. I was a flower in the winter, isolated, devoid of my societal nessecities bending under the weight of the frost. The two places were so different I distinguished them as separate universes.
                     Religion is odd like that, it makes you unsure of who you are, of why you even exist on this planet. Of whether you even have any power to change who you are the actions you take in your life. Religion makes you question all that you once held certain in your life. Judaism gave me a new name, language and culture. Later I would learn how to integrate these things into pre-existing life, but at eight it felt uncannily like I changed every time I kissed the mezuzah on the arched doorway and entered hebrew school.
                 Hannah, in A Time Of Angels by K. Hesse is weighed down by her religion. Growing up in plague ridden Boston at the time of World War II, Hannah is weighed down enough as it is. She pretends to be a boy as to keep a job as a paper boy (adolescents who hawked news headlines in order to sell periodicals to the public), evading the groping hands of her supervisors and waking up at dawn to provide for her haphazard family consisting of her beloved sisters Libbie, Eve, her Tanta (aunt) Rose and Rose's companion of sorts Vashti. Hannah mothers her sisters in spite of hardworking Rose's insistence that she leave it to Vashti, who Hannah believes to be "like a buzzard" or parasite that sucks the life out of everything that she knows to be good about the narrow world that is all that Hannah knows.
                However, Vashti is not the worst thing out in Hannah's world, influenza is a threat much worse than any one person and when Hannah's cherished Tanta and sisters fall prey to it, Hannah is left alone with Vashti, the one person in there family who is selfless enough to send Hannah away from flu riddled Boston, to the country where the plague cannot touch her no matter how much her blood family pleads for her to stay with them. When you love someone, it is the hardest to let them go. You want them so badly that you cannot send them away, even though it is the very pinnacle of love: letting go.
                  So Hannah is alone, on a train to be entrusted into the care of a strange family, she turns to her faith her religion. The fact that it was so hard for her to do this. She "wrestled with the unknown force, whose magnitude of decision and aftermath seemed of greatest weight and caused the greatest of terrors to a girl who survived only by focusing on the path just in front of her."She is torn because her closest person, her aunt told her to pray to God for deliverance but Hannah is not sure if she can. By choosing to accept religion, you are choosing to accept that you are not in control of your life anymore. Hannah has survived her harsh world purely relying on her own wits and talents, to give up this control is like betting your life on something. You are completely at a loss for jurisdiction concerning yourself, but you have something to blame when things go wrong.
                   Hannah is at a loss for what to do, she wants to respect Tanta Rose's memorie but cannot bring herself to relinquish her firm belief that she can decide her fate. But subconsciously, she transcends into a dream world. She begins to see angels everywhere saying "powers once unknown to me now look like the works of a phantom hand, one that cradled Tanta Rose..." in other words, God. Hannah describes her acceptance of a higher power and joining a new society and seeing a new world. I think that Hannah had to completely let go of what she had known before in order to survive her present. The past was weighing her down. And the idea of religion was weighing her down because it was bonded with the past. Yet be releasing her past as the thing that shaped her essence of self, she could embrace a belief that could lift her away from her loss.
                  So although I am not sure whether I have accepted God I understand what Hannah means when she describes religion being a different world. Its such a controversial and relative thing, the cause of so many conflicts, yet some say it heals. Its something so different from everything else that it becomes, in a sense, a different existence.

Age Divided

             I recently read the book "Cuba Turns 15" by Maria Osa. The book follows Violet Paz, a 15 year old Sophomore at the huge impersonal Tri-dist high school. Violet has two best friends, bubbly and hippy-like Leda Londquist t the serious and driven Janell Henry. Violet is spotted by her ax-like teacher, Mr.Axelrod as funny and is put on the speech team for original comedy. At the same time, her traditionalist grandmother and Polish mother are planning her a quincenera, or coming of age ceremony for a `15 year old girl. Violet is doubtful of having her quince, but she gradually comes around to it, as well as to the idea of exploring her Cuban Heritage.  I think that the reason that Violet decides to join the speech team and explore her heritage is because of her quince.
           Before Violet decided to accept her quincenera as something that she wasn't going to fight and something that she actually wants to do, she feels like she is 5, as she says, "a little girl still running home when the bell rings" She doesn't want to do anything at her school in terms of activities and doesn't want to involve herself in anything outside her comfort zone. Also, she tries to avoid mentioning anything that even remotely involves Cuba, a subject she knows that her dad doesn't want to talk about. However, after she accepts her quincenera role and responsibilities she decides to stick with speech team and her competition speech becomes better and better. Also, she begins to explore her Cuban heritage, no matter what her dad says. A quincenera and any coming of age ceremony is about accepting your responsibilities and becoming serious about her life. I think that Violet is realizing that she has a responsibility not only to herself but to the world to let loose and explore who she really is.
             In conclusion, Violet became more risk-taking and open after she accepted the responsibilities of a quincenera. But I think that the quincenera was just a nudge that Violet needed to realize the responsibility she had to herself to be happy, and the responsibility to the world to show them what a great person she really was.

Am I Blue?-Well Does Society Think You Are?

                                                                                           

             Growing up as a teenager is a whirlpool of expectations: where you go to school, how you dress, your level of popularity, even who you love. Everybody expects you to be somebody. And that somebody isn’t always who you are, its just who people are confortable with you being. These societal pressures are crushing and can lead to the elimination of your uniqueness. In his short story, Am I Blue?, author Bruce Coville asserts that conformity limits ones self and forces people to fit into boxes and stereotypes formed by others. Coville does this by showing the reader how people have to conform to the stereotypes of their jobs and societal positions and how many gay people change themselves to conform to stereotypes and, also, that society even has stereotypes for gay people.

Sometimes who you are can be more terrifying than any other outside threat. Some people spend hundreds of dollars on therapists trying to fix something about the person they are versus the person they want to be. Many gay people in the short story, Am I Blue? by Bruce Coville are scared by who they are and how that might make them different from what society expects from them. This leads them to change themselves in order to fit into the boxes people put them in based on their station in life. One example is found when Vince, the main character, has been given the gift of being able to see if someone is gay (as they appear blue if they are). Vince says “Mr. Alwain, the fat guy who ran the grocery store, looked like a giant blueberry—which surprised me, because he was married and had three kids.”  Vince is surprised because the man seems to be straight with a family and a typical job, but he actually isn’t. While being straight (a more typical existence in most areas) might be easier, Alwain decided to cover up an integral part of who he is because of what society might expect him to be.  Another example found in Am I Blue? is when Vince is watching the news. He says he “the shade of a spring sky—pale blue, but very definite. So was the congressman he interviewed, who happened to be a notorious Republican homophobe.”  The congressman spoke derogatively towards homosexuals, though he was one himself. This man probably felt pressures to conform to his party’s and his conservative surrounding society (Republicans are traditionally against the idea of homosexuality)’s viewpoint and changed himself to appear heterosexual. The congressman felt he had to be different than who he was because of his societal status. A third example of changing yourself to fit expectations in Am I Blue? is also found when Vince is watching the news. Vince says he “did get a kick out of the three blue guys I spotted in the sports feature on the team favored to win the Superbowl.”  People do not expect football players to be gay, as football is thought of as an extremely masculine sport. The football players who appeared blue have not identified themselves as gay, probably because of what society expected people in their proffession to be. They buried their homosexuality to appear “normal.”

On Facebook, if someone posts a picture of a male wearing jewelry, pink or extremely fashion forward clothes, there’s almost always a comment saying “that’s so gay.” Some people who post things like that aren’t homophobic (they’re just joking), some are, but it goes to show that while society holds stereotypes for people to not be gay, there are also stereotypes for what gay people should look like. So even if you openly acknowledge that you’re gay, you are still not free of stereotypes and expectations. In Bruce Coville’s short story, this is evident.  When Vince and his fairy godfather Melvin are in a café, Melvin shows Vince how many people are gay in the restaurant that is filled mostly with theater club members. Almost 1/3 of them are and Melvin explains that, “Groups like that tend to have a higher percentage of gay people, because we’re so naturally artistic.”  And “Of course, some bozos take a fact like that and decide that everyone doing theater is gay. Remember, two thirds of the people you’re seeing aren’t blue.”  As Melvin explained, many people think that all people in theater are gay just because it is artistic, which gays “naturally” are. People, therefore, stereotype people in arts as “gay” even though a lot of them aren’t. Society also stereotype gay people as to how they move, not just what groups they are in.  When Vince first meets Melvin he asks, “Do you have to walk like that?” He states that he is afraid that “walking around with a guy who moved the way Melvin did wasn’t going to do anything to improve the situation{he was in}.” In other words, Vince thinks that people will identify Melvin as gay just by how he walks. Society stereotypes people as “gay” in terms of how they move and what groups they associate with.

In Bruce Coville’s fascinating and poignant short story, Am I Blue?, Coville focuses on the idea of conformity, the injustice of the stereotypical expectations and pressures society puts on both gay people and non-gay people alike. Coville demonstrates that many gay people change or hide who they are in order to fit in with who society thinks they should; be based upon their job or societal position. Coville also asserts that people have stereotypes for what a gay person should be as well. These issues lead to nothing but hiding and trying to fit inside other people’s boxes. The world is not a filing cabinet, people don’t exactly match a certain container and you can’t just put them away. So after seeing the damage that can be done, I challenge you re-examine your own thinking, ask yourself, do I accept the stereotypes that society has put in place for me and my peers? Or do I choose to challenge what people say people “are” and “aren’t,” making my own judgments instead of blindly putting everybody into boxes. It’s your decision.

The Drummer Boy of Shiloh Reading Response

The Drummer Boy of Shiloh is a short story written by the author Ray Bradbury featuring a drummer boy by the name of Joby, during the time of the Civil War, before the battle of Shiloh. The story opens on a peach orchard near the church of Shiloh, where a restless army waits for dawn, and closes on the same orchard. It would seem that nothing has changed in the orchard, but it has. Or shall I say, Joby has. Joby has gone from a scared and lonely child to a purposeful and ready young man in time for the upcoming battle. This change comes courtesy of the father figure General. Bradbury shows how important a strong father is to a pubescent boy in this coming of age story.

            The General, his name and allegiance unspecified, is introduced as a person of great importance, but is then shown to be a father figure. When Bradbury introduces the General as a character, he includes a detailed description of his scent. “He smelled as all fathers should smell, of salt-sweat, tobacco, horse and boot leather and the earth he walked upon.” This describes the General as what any man in the orchard at that moment may have smelled like, as they all probably wore leather boots and had become sweaty from marching in their uniforms. However, Joby interprets this scent as the scent of a “father,” and therefore he sees the General as such. Joby needs a father figure because he does not have his parents with him. He says that he feels his parents “go farther away into the dark,” showing that either they or he left the other and that he feels the absence of parental figures.  Before the General comes Joby is “mak(ing) himself small.” He is trying to hide from the world. However, when the General comes to talk to him, he draws back out from his shell and sits up, not hiding from the world anymore. The General is a father figure to Joby because Joby interprets his scent as such, which begins to draw Joby out of his shell because of his need for a father figure since his parents are both absent.

            The General is definitely a father figure to Joby, and having a strong authoritative yet caring presence in your life is important to a young teenager. An example of the importance of a strong father figure in Bradbury’s is the change that Joby goes through, The act that initiates and brings upon this change is when the General comes to Joby and sits beside him to talk to him of his importance, which Joby has very much doubted. Before the General comes to Joby, Joby is described as thinking of himself as “no more than a toy,” as compared to the other men in the army who he believes can defend themselves with their swords and shields and guns while Joby only has a drum which he sees as a handicap. He does not want dawn and the battle to come; he tries to hide by “living small” and folding himself up noiselessly so that nobody notices him. He is “crying before a fight,” a mess before the battle, lost and confused. He needs someone to show him which way to turn and what his purpose as a soldier is. This is where the General comes in. After the General speaks to Joby, Joby slowly arouses himself from the self-pity and despair he is feeling about what is to come. The General sits down and talks to Joby about how important he is to the whole army. The General describes him as “his (the General’s) right hand and his left.” He says that Joby is like “the heart of the army” who “sets the pace,” of the morale and therefore the army’s prospects. The General invokes the confidence in Joby that Joby did not know existed. Slowly Joby begins to right himself and pull together. He realizes that he can’t just hide, that he needs to be there for the army. He “swallows” and “wipes his eyes.”  The change is clear. Joby needed someone to help him get back on his feet and point him in the direction to go, and a strong father figure like the General did just that.

            Bradbury’s story proves that a strong father figure is important to teenagers like 14-year-old Joby. The General is a father figure because of Joby’s interpretation of him and because of his need for one. This presence helps change Joby from a hiding scared boy, to a stronger and ready young man. The General as a father figure gives Joby direction, and Joby is ready for the dawning battle.