The First Decision Reef, the main character in the novel, The First Stone, by Don Aker, makes a bad decision and ultimately has to deal with the consequences. To begin, Reef latches his anger onto a stone and deliberately throws it over an overpass into oncoming traffic. The stone causes a major accident between not one, but several cars and severely injures a teenage girl. Fortunately for Reef, the Judge sentences him to live at North Hills Group Home, and to volunteer at a rehabilitation centre. This punishment changes Reef’s life for the better.
Bad things happen to good people. A Series of Unfortunate Events, by Lemony Snicket, is a story about the orphans that are in a bad situation. Violet, Klaus, and Sunny Baudelaire parents died in a fire while Count Olaf is trying to steal their fortune. They escaped Count Olaf and got to safety for a little. They learned that bad things happen to good people too.
In both “The Boat” and Brooklyn, the families are torn between several incidents or situations that occur during them. Conflict an occur frequently between families or friends when difficult situations rise to the surface. The stress that occurs during these stories shows the tension between staying home or leaving in the book Brooklyn, as well as in “The Boat.” In this essay I will discuss some parts of the stories that showed tension that has occured in the short story and the book as well. Especially, I will discuss the difficulty the boy had to endure, and how his choices impacted his future relationship with his parents.
The First Stone You can’t make everyone happy. Sometimes the decision of the judges only satisfy some people. In the novel The First Stone, by Don Aker, a young teen by the name Chad “Reef” Kennedy finds himself in a tough situation and his sentencing is being in rehab and doing community service. Reef is responsible for putting Leeza a young girl, in the hospital because of his actions. Since he is in rehab, many people wished he went to jail.
The book “In the lake of the woods”, written by Tim O’Brien, is about a Vietnam veteran and politicians story. The main character, John Wade, is a Vietnam veteran who was involved with a brutal massacre. John was also a politician, and in fear that the massacre he was involved with would affect his political career, John does everything he can to cover up this incident. During this time John's wife mysteriously disappears. John has an ambition throughout the story to cover up what happened to profit his own career.
The article “Tarmageddon”, written by Andrew Nikiforuk,starts by stating how Europeans felt towards Canada before and continues by explaining what has changed their stance towards Canada. He then bulges on by describing oil and the specifics of the oil Canada is refining while perceiving its problems along the way while portraying how Canada changed, explaining why those changes happened. Towards the end of the article Andrew looks into the government’s approach on the matter and how it is ignoring the entire incident. Finally, in the end he comes to his conclusion and warning about the country’s future and how it will become if nothing is done. In short Nikiforuk, elaborates about the negative effects of the tar sands on Canada.
In Tim O’Brien’s novel “In the Lake of the Woods” the protagonist John Wade a Vietnam war veteran struggles through life after retiring from the army. Through textual evidence within the novel one of John’s struggles is battling his Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) which is attributed to traumatic events such as war that soldiers deal with when coming back from war into civilian life throughout his senior years. This disease is diagnosed after analyzing scholars work upon these mental illness that soldiers have. These sources are “Traumatic Encounters: Reading Tim O’Brien” as well as “PLAUSIBILITY OF DENIAL: Tim O'Brien, My Lai, and America” both scholarly sources discuss the traumatic experiences that John had which led to his PTSD.
A previous prisoner with Dick Hickock and Perry Smith, Floyd Wells, believed that he had some part in the murders of the Clutters because he told both Dick and Perry about the Clutter’s wealth, this resulted in Dick telling Floyd that once Perry and himself get out of jail, their going to rob the Clutters. To avoid any problems toward him, Floyd creates an Alabi and gives this information to Alvin Dewey, the investigator of this case. Alvin receives photographs of both Dick and Perry where Alvin’s wife comments on how Dick looks like a murderer, but Perry doesn’t look evil at all. Alvin, with the help of Floyed, continues to further investigate both Dick and Perry’s life and habits. They start by going to Perry’s old apartment in Mexico, then
Death will always complement war. This is seen clearly in Tim O’Brien’s short story “The Man I Killed”. In this tale the Main character, Tim, is vividly describing in his mind the enemy Vietcong solider he just killed life story before his death. He details everything, from the visible wounds on the soldier’s body to a fantasy of the man’s life. Meanwhile, to soldiers in Tim’s platoon acknowledge that he killed this man and try to speak to him about it.
The Child Called “It” In the novel The Child Called “It” by Dave Pelzer. In the book the main character Dave experiences what it is like to be abused. In the beginning he talks about how it all started and by the end, he finds a way to escape.
In the short story “Gryphon” by Charles Baxter, Tommy`s fourth grade teacher gets sick, so the next day when the students arrive to their classroom they have a substitute teacher. The substitute teacher Miss Ferenczi and the Mr. Hibler the real teacher have different ways of keeping the students engaging the students. Mr. Hibler, teaches out of a book and when he is teaching English literature his students do not fully engaged in the material as he goes through it. From the students’ point of view, Mr. Hibler’s class is not that fun. Mr. Hibler has a time for everything such as English, math, and recess, but he only teaches the students what they need to know, and not any of the fun facts that surround the material that is currently being
In the book Amusing Ourselves to Death by Neil Postman, he discusses the “dangers” of television and elaborates his thoughts about how that specific media was affecting American society. Some of the main points Postman touched on can be compared to the modern media society has now. Postman elaborated that television gained control of American society, which meant that Americans stopped questioning the media and opened the opportunity for fake news to be spread. Americans didn’t know what was real and what was fake because, at the end of the day, everything was for entertainment purposes as Postman expresses. The most important topic he covered was that the media was becoming a curriculum where Americans gained their knowledge and ideals.
In the story, “A Worn Path,” it is clear there is a lot of underlying meaning related to Christian values. Although the story doesn’t directly talk about the main character, Phoenix, being a Christian in any way, there are moments where she does have Christian values. This leads readers to believe that the author intended the story to have more than just a surface level meaning. The connection of a Christian worldview is evident in the way Phoenix has a selfless concern for her grandson, representing the true spirit of giving and self-sacrifice, and also the fact the story is set on a “worn path,” Phoenix experiences hardships much like how being a Christian isn’t always a clear path to follow.
“Click-Clack the RattleBag” by Neil Gainman is a suspenseful short story. The kid in the story wants the adult writer to tell him a scary story about the Click-Clack RattleBag. The kid explains that the click clacks are monsters. But suddenly at the end things start to click and clack then the adult feels fingers wrapping around him. The author develops the characters' different points of view in order to build up suspense throughout the story.
Fear plays a big part in everyone’s lives. While not everyone will admit it, everyone is scared of something. There is a lot that isn’t known about the world and everything in it. For some this is a tool that can be used to develop horror in literature as well as many other things. “The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.
