Most Important Line

     The most important line from chapter 211 is: "And then there was a sound like people fighting with swords and I could feel a strong wind and a roaring started and I closed my eyes and the roaring got louder and I groaned really loudly but I couldn't block it out of my ears and I thought the little station was going to collapse or there was a big fire somewhere and I was going to die" (Haddon 176). This line is important to the chapter because it humanizes the main character Christopher. Christopher is a 15 year old boy with Asperger's and all through the book you struggle to connect with him. He's so logical and he doesn't see the point in stories and he refuses to eat certain foods. When you are reading the book you are floating, trying to find a tether to hold onto and keep the reality of the book in mind. And this line is really important because it gives you that line, you feel his pain when he is in the train station. You hear the screech of the train and the terror it causes in him. 
     The line is also really important to the chapter because it allows you to realize how hard it is for Christopher to overcome his nature. How his brain picks up everything and the train is sensory overload for him. It makes the chapter easier to understand, you comprehend that its not easy for him to drop everything he knows and go to London on his own. But he is fighting for it, for the life with his Mother that he wants and the life without his father that he needs. It ties the whole  point of the chapter and the story together and gives you something to root for. You want to root for Christopher, you want him to succeed.

Monstrous Beauty

     There are 3 main characters in my summer reading book, Monstrous Beauty. It starts off with introducing the readers to a mermaid named Syrenka. Syrenka is a dynamic character as the story proceeds. In the beginning she has resigned herself to a lonely existence, with the only company being the rest of the mermaids. But then she falls in love with a human named Ezra. Ezra is the next main character, who is introduced to us as he discovers Syrenka. Throughout the book, Syrenka and Ezra bond and Syrenka decides that she wants to be human. She changes from the laid-back and resigned mermaid to a determined one. She tells Ezra the conditions of becoming human and fights for that right, eventually winning and being able to devote her life to Ezra.

     Ezra is a dynamic character because at the beginning he is lost. After the death of his father Ezra's life is at a standstill and he doesn't know how to move on. After meeting Syrenka for the first time, clarity blooms in his life. He studies her, marking out her species in his scientific journal. Every day he spends with her, he falls a little more in love. By the end of the book, Ezra is logical, willing to do anything to save Syrenka. Even sacrificing himself so that she may live on.

     The third main character is Hester, who by far is the most important. Hester lives a few generations after Syrenka and Ezra. And the book during this part takes place in modern times. Hester is a dynamic character because at the beginning of the book she, as Syrenka once did, has given herself a life of loneliness, as illustarted in this quote by Hester. “I haven’t got any lovers, smart aleck.’ She startled herself with the thumping emptiness she felt in her chest as she added, ‘I can only ever be alone.” (Fama 117) For her family is cursed, every women in her ancestry has died after giving birth to their first baby (a girl.) But when she meets Ezra one day (which is explained further in the book) she decides to fight for her life to live. She digs into her family's past, piecing together the mystery that is her family. By the end of the book Hester has fought for her happiness and chosen her own destiny. 

     Within the development of the characters, the story delves into the theme. The layers of Hester's past revealing that taking someone's life into you own hands can result in disaster.

 

Book Review

This is a summary of the book, discussing some of the elements that are incorporated in the book. 

Video

This video ties to an article video that connects to my theme. Its about a mother who sacrificed her life so that her child could live and my book's theme is about protection. And many elements in the book deal with the mothers giving their lives to their children.