Character Analysis Of Paul In Tangerine

The novel Tangerine, written by Edward Bloor, perfectly demonstrates how a character can change their ways and learn lessons. When the protagonist, Paul Fisher, was first introduced, he was a shy, quiet kid, who never tried to change his situation. He has a terrible relationship with his brother, Erik, and is literally terrified of him and what he will do to him. In the beginning of the book, he was moving from Houston, Texas to his new home in Tangerine, Florida. In his fresh start to life in Tangerine, he learns that he shouldn’t be scared, and that he needs to start standing up for himself and letting his voice, thoughts, and opinions be heard. Even though Paul starts off scared, afraid, intimidated, and full of self doubt, he learns that he needs to change his ways and attitude towards his life, and to take action to make things right. As previously stated, in the beginning of the book, Paul was super quiet, shy, and lonely. In fact, his only friend was his mom. Paul never tried to change anything, and never made his voice heard. He had terrible self esteem - mainly because he felt it was his fault he was blind, and had to

He begins to realize how he should not be afraid of everything all the time, and how he needs to start making his voice heard. Paul starts to accomplish this by helping students out of the broken classroom when the sinkhole forms in Lake Windsor Middle School. But, he still doubts himself. “I’m not saying I was a hero. All I did was slide around in mud and tried to pull people out. But I didn’t panic and run either.” This quote shows that Paul still doubts himself, but he knows that what he did was a good thing. As the story continues, Paul learns how he lost his vision. He now knows it wasn’t his fault, but his brothers. This realization was crucial for Paul to begin to gain confidence, and learn not to be so hard on