Comparing Bill Bryson's The Life And Times Of The Thunderbolt Kid

The Life and Times of Hannah Sneed reading The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid The book that I chose to read this summer was The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid by Bill Bryson. It was a very fun read with nice, unique characters and hilarious stories. The book takes place in Des Moines, Iowa during the 1950s. It is about a young boy named Billy Bryson growing up and also sometimes what was going on within America during that time period. There were many characters in this book, but the main ones were Billy, his mother and father, and his friends Stephen Katz, Doug Willoughby, and Jed Mattes. The theme of this book would be reminiscing about those times when he was younger and him using his imagination to make fun out of even the worst situations. The author probably wanted to educate or remind people of the 1950s and make people laugh and to tell his story. The tone of the book was a sort of

I thought the kinds of risky things he would do and hoops he would jump through just to save a little money were really amusing. The sketchy and questionable doctor and dentist stories were some of my favorites even though some parts made me shudder. I was really uncomfortable when he talked about his dentist having shaky hands and being surprised at the strength of his own tools, it made my teeth feel all gross when I read “...drilled through rocky molar and found the pulpy mass of nerve within...” I can not imagine what it would be like to have a father so cheap that he would risk his own and his family’s health to save money. That being said, I thought it was equally as strange when he took his family to Disneyland instead of somewhere cheap and educational. It’s possible that the whole time he had just been saving up money so he could spoil them like that. I also like how Billy looks up to him and trusts him so much and thinks he’s the best sports writer in the