In a society full of injustices and conflicts, Jewell Parker Rhodes' "Ghost Boys" is a moving novel that shines a light on the sensitive topic of racial injustices and empathy. The protagonist, Jerome Rogers, is a 12-year-old boy navigating in a disadvantaged Chicago neighborhood, where the echoes of meth labs exploding and guns being fired are all common sights. One day after school, Jerome's innocence is tragically mistaken for a threat when he is spotted with a toy gun and shot by Officer Moore in a drive-by shooting. Sadly, this heartbreaking scenario isn't a figment of fiction, it’s a reflection of the gruesome killing of Tamir Rice, whom the book is based upon. Following Jerome's death, he meets Sara Moore, Officer Moore's daughter. Sara appears as a fundamental character in the story, offering a different perspective that helps bridge the gap between the living and the dead. Empathy is seen to be the central theme in Jerome and Sara's relationship, although …show more content…
By facing her privilege and realizing the unfairness of Jerome's death, she experiences moral awareness and self-growth, which leads her to a route of healing. A significant example of this was when she became curious about seeing Emmit Till's casket. By confronting this unpleasant reality, she was able to come to terms with the fact that the world isn't the enchanted land that she had grown up believing it to be. Sara's innocence is destroyed by her encounter with Jerome's ghost, while other characters are known to be aware of the general systemic biases that exist around them. Sara's innocence, in the sense that she finally realizes the world isn't a safe place for everyone. Jerome wasn’t too happy about Sara being the only person to see him, why couldn’t it be Ma or Kim, he thought? In the end, he realizes it was a good thing, Sara is now aware of these prejudices and has the passion to
For awhile she feels deathly lonely "cheated and robbed of the life that more fortunate girls seemed to have (Chapter 16)." However, Sara manages to get into college and despite all the discouragement and hard work she graduates and gets a job as a teacher. She gets her own apartment, which she vowed to keep clean and empty, a dramatic change from her small and filthy childhood home she shared with her whole family on Hester Street. And even despite her mother's death, her father's rapid remarriage, and then his diamond earring wearing new wife's attempt to blackmail her into losing her teaching job, Sara still manages to find happiness. She gets married to the principal at her school, even when she thinks that her step mother drove him away. Yet, in the midst of all her good fortune, "[her] joy hurt like guilt (Chapter 21)." So much in fact that even through all her hatred for him, she still developed a longing to see her
Amina Gautier has been awarded with Best African American Fiction and New Stories from the South; in addition, she has successfully created At Risk. Gautier’s story is based on the African American community and the different types of struggle families can realistically face. However, if a white person would have written this exact story it could have been misinterpreted and considered racist. Stereotypes such as fathers not being present, delinquencies and educational status are presented in the various short stories. “Boogiemen”, “Afternoon Tea” and “Some Other Kind of Happiness” are all examples of stories in which the father is not present.
Sara feels horrible that she didn’t come to see her mother and spend more time with her. She knows that she should’ve come to see her mother instead of investing so much time in school. Then, her mother died a couple of days later. She decides to stay and visit her father, Reb Smolinsky, often but doesn’t visit him after he gets married again only thirty days after her mother died. A couple months later, she sees Reb again, but he’s working.
... while she still has time (257). She fails at first, thinking her father is “bereft of his senses” in his second marriage (258). She believes this despite the Torah saying, “a man must have a wife to keep him pure, otherwise his eyes are tempted by evil” (259). Gradually, Sara begins to understand her father: the only thing he has in life is his fanatical adherence to traditions; “In a world where all is changed, he alone remained unchanged” (296). Reb has a deep and true fear of God, to expect him to change beliefs that he believes have been handed down by God, beliefs that have persisted for thousands of years, is illogical. It is impossible to reconcile fully the New World with the Old, and it is the responsibility of the New to be the more flexible, unfair as it may be.
The two Wes Moores in this narrative share a common identity. They have the same name, are from the same place, and they are both black males. As children, they both had the same kind of personalities and traits that are beginning to put them down an unsuccessful path. However, as the two boys begin to grow older, they begin to change differently. Their identities begin to differ when you examine their lives and their incredibly different futures. To begin, the author Wes Moore’s future was one that was positive, due to the choices made by him and his family. His family dynamic and support was strong, and became stronger after his father died of acute
Perhaps the best example of Sara’s deviation from her Jewish heritage and her attempt to assimilate was her refusal to allow the undertaker to tear her suit during her mother’s funeral service. The clothing that she wears is a symbol to her of wealth and of being an American. For Sara the ripping of her clothing had become an “empty symbol,” a cultural construction with only symbolic meaning that could help to identify her ethnicity, and does not serve any logical purpose. After being distanced from her family and immersed in American culture for so long, she no longer understands the purpose of the action, and posits verily that “Tearing [her only suit] wouldn’t bring Mother back to life again” (Yezierska 255). This represents a clear distinction between volunta...
In Dean Koontz’s book Odd Thomas a young man’s life is laid bare before us. The book’s protagonist is a 20 year old named Odd Thomas. Odd is fry cook at a diner, in a small town in California called Pico Mundo. His life is described as pretty normal except Odd has the ability to see dead people. More importantly he not only sees dead people but he is given this ability to seemingly help dead people right the wrongs in their lives. The book is written in first person and it gives Odd’s account of a major event that happened in August, in the sleepy town of Pico Mundo. Through his recount and back story, we see not only what happens but the protagonist’s thoughts and feelings. Koontz’s book, Odd Thomas, uses in story influences to provide convincing characterization for a well-rounded main character that has had an interesting life.
Where they grew up, kids as young as 8 years old were recruited into illegal operations; Wes and Tony included. Mary tried everything she could, but had lost her sons to the wonder and curiosity that money brings. The important place a mother should hold in her son’s life vanished and she was left to take care of their mistakes. Later in their lives, both boys were caught in a heist that set them up for an entire lifetime in jail. Their arrest sent “cheering responses” from everyone in their community. The boys were not only involved with a robbery, but a murder as well. The word spread quickly about their sentences and a “collective sigh of relief seeped through Baltimore. At home, Mary wept” (Moore 155). Many families go through traumatic experiences comparable to Mary’s situation. The choices her sons made left her alone, parallel to the isolation the boys were experiencing as
Racism as we all know it is very disturbing, annoying, and is not tolerable. This story is based on life on a foundation of segregation and dangers of racism. This one novel is placed in a small, under-populated city of Vermont, where a family of three, the Sutters, another family of 3, the Hirsch's with a caring person, named Sara Chickering, and some people face many problems and solutions in their lives.
Prejudice is an issue that cannot be easily avoided in today's society. It has and always will have a huge impact on the discrimination that some people face based on religion, appearance, background, mental/physical disabilities and etc.
Janie Crawford, the novel’s main character, is an African American woman who eventually married three times throughout her lifetime. Her mother was raped by her schoolteacher and eventually gave birth to Janie, leaving her behind for Janie’s grandmother to raise her. A research article focused on Their Eyes Were Watching God concluded that “The devastating impact of the white discourse on black people which has targeted their identity is an integral part of this paper” (J Nov. Appl Sci. 1). It is evident in the novel that Janie (along with several other African Americans) are mistreated because of their skin color. This novel was set in the early 1900s, when although slavery was abolished, African Americans were not treated equally; the whites still held an unwritten superiority towards them. Although an imbalance of equality between whites and blacks is present, this novel should not be banned from the classroom because it teaches the cruel but true history of our nation. Our country’s history cannot be ignored like this, because it is a part of a valuable piece of literature and it makes society appreciate our new customs of equality that currently
The main character is completely alienated from the world around him. He is a black man living in a white world, a man who was born in the South but is now living in the North, and his only form of companionship is his dying wife, Laura, whom he is desperate to save. He is unable to work since he has no birth certificate—no official identity. Without a job he is unable to make his mark in the world, and if his wife dies, not only would he lose his lover but also any evidence that he ever existed. As the story progresses he loses his own awareness of his identity—“somehow he had forgotten his own name.” The author emphasizes the main character’s mistreatment in life by white society during a vivid recollection of an event in his childhood when he was chased by a train filled with “white people laughing as he ran screaming,” a hallucination which was triggered by his exploration of the “old scars” on his body. This connection between alienation and oppression highlight Ellison’s central idea.
The novel, Silent Alarm, by Jennifer Banash, takes an interesting perspective in an all-too-common tragedy that is sadly becoming more and more prevalent lately. This novel dives deep into the emotions of young violin prodigy Alys, whose brother decided to shoot and kill fifteen kids at their school one day, then proceed to shoot himself in the head. The book ventures through all of Alys’ emotions, from anger, to sadness, grief, and more. This book was particularly special because of it’s interesting viewpoint, and at first glance it sounded like an emotionally tolling and sophisticated book. It's surprising twist makes it definitely worth the read.
This novel illustrates the power and importance of community solidarity. For example, Sethe receives help from members of the Underground Railroad to exorcise Beloved’s ghost. Morrison writes, “Some brought what they could and what they believed would work. Stuffed in apron pockets, strung around their necks, lying in the space between their breasts. Others brought Christian faith--as shield and sword. Most brought a little of both” (303). The town bands together against the ghost. Critics discuss many examples about the universality of community solidarity in Beloved. Wahneema Lubiano writes, “This novel is, finally, a text about the community as a site of complications that empowers, as much as its social history within the larger formation debilitates, its members.” This statement relates well to the fact that the community binds together to fight the ghost.
Mrs. Jackson and the young man endured so many different events throughout their lifetimes, whether it be a simple trip to a doctor's office to get medicine for a boy she did not know was even alive or in the young man’s case, a woman he may not ever find, displaying the