Sold Character Analysis

According to facts.randomhistory.com, there are currently more human slaves in the world than ever before. It is difficult to imagine how anyone could withstand the harsh mental and physical abuse caused by this utterly brutal treatment, yet that is exactly what occurred in Patricia McCormick's novel, Sold. Lakshmi, a thirteen year-old girl needs to support her poor family. She meets a woman who tells her where to find a job as a maid in India. When she arrives, she finds out that she has been sold as a sex slave by the woman. Lakshmi endures cruelty given by Mumtaz, the owner of the brothel, and her customers, but survives due to friendship and kindness from a few key characters throughout the novel.

Harish, the child in which Lakshmi first

described as “the David Beckham boy”, helps Lakshmi to withstand the horrendous things Mumtaz and her customers do to her. At first, Lakshmi is envious of Harish, because he happens to be much more fortunate than Lakshmi and is able to go to school, even though his mother is also a sex slave at Mumtaz’s brothel. After a while, Harish becomes one of Lakshmi’s only friends at the Happy House. A small gift from Harish makes Lakshmi “undone by the simply kindness of a small boy with a yellow pencil.” (183) Harish gave Lakshmi something to look forward to throughout the day so that she does not spend all of her time dreading the next night with her customers. He taught her Hindi and English words very evening after he came home from school. He taught her random words like, “candy, bread, cricket, pen,” (179) and even how to introduce herself in English, which later saves her from being kept in the Happy House. While teaching Lakshmi Hindi, Lakshmi didn’t recognize the word “cook” so Harish draws her a funny picture and even acts out a cook in a silly way until she could figure it out. Harish brought back Lakshmi’s laughter. “‘Cook!’ I cry out as last. Harish throws back his head and laughs. And I laugh, too.” (175)
One other character also helped Lakshmi to withstand what she was going through in the Happy House, Lakshmi’s friend, and fellow human slave, Shahanna. When Lakshmi is first brought into the Happy House, she refuses to be forced into such filthy work, resulting in Mumtaz to lock her away in an empty room for many days in order for her to learn her lesson. Shahanna helps Lakshmi to survive those stressful days of starvation by giving her a cup of tea. “And so I am in the corner of the locked-in room, my face to the wall, when the door opens. It is Shahanna… holding a cup of tea.” (114) At the Happy House, it is dangerous for Lakshmi and the others to not be able to use any form of protection. Shahanna gives Lakshmi a condom and tells Lakshmi to ask her customers to use it so that she can be safe. “Ask the men to use it, so that you do not get a disease.” (127) Shahanna says.
There is also another very important character, a man whom Lakshmi never learned the name of (176).

The man gave Lakshmi an accidental kindness, hence the title of the page. The man comes one night into the Happy House as one Lakshmi’s customers, but unlike the other men, he holds Lakshmi. This really helps Lakshmi to release the stress that she has been holding onto at the Happy House and remember what it is like to be home. “I could feel myself, my true self, give in to the simple pleasure of being held.” (176) “His skin was soft--- like the velvet of Tali’s nose” (176) The man also gave Lakshmi something to look forward to, which in turned helped her to be patient as she was trapped in the Happy House. She had waited many days for him, hoping that they would fall in love with one another. “It has been twelve days since the hugging man came. (179) “It has been thirty days since the hugging man came.” (185)

Harish, Shahanna, and the hugging man are all character that supported Lakshmi and helped her to endure Mumtaz’s and her customers’ cruelty within the Happy House. They all helped her with friendship and kindness to stay strong, giving her a reason to keep pushing forward even when she is put into the pain and suffering in human trafficking. Patricia McCormick managed to intensely capture the reality of human trafficking and sex slavery in her novel Sold, after traveling to India and Nepal to research the customs and hear the stories of other girls rescued from the terror of human

trafficking.