Martian Abroad Character Analysis

Martians Abroad, A Coming of Age Novel Martians Abroad is a unique coming of age story, set hundreds of years in the future, when interplanetary travel is common place. The protagonist of Martians Abroad, is Polly who experiences both typical and unique themes in the coming of age genre. At the beginning of the novel, Polly is shipped from her home on Mars, to a large earth academy. At this academy, Polly experiences typical coming of age themes in romance, interfering mothers, bullies, and school issues. However, Polly also faces unique coming of age issues such as risking her life to save others. In Martians Abroad, Polly must learn to adapt to new situations, both for the sake of her future, and to keep those she cares for safe. From

Polly’s first crush on earth, was of a boy named Tenzig. They bonded at first because they both had desires to be interplanetary piolets, however Tenzig never thought she had a chance because the competition to get into flight school was vast, and only those with elite families got in. But as Polly began to gain recognition at the school, he became afraid that she could take the spotlight from him, and take his place at flight school. To regain the spotlight, Tenzig formulated a plain to embarrass Polly at the most important night at Galileo Academy, many elite families gather for a family night/dance. To accomplish his goal, he led her to believe shared her feelings, then embarrass her in the middle of a dance, in front of everyone. Her brother encourages her to not let Tenzig no he hurt her by fighting back, but to act as if nothing happened, because that would hurt him more, and her fighting back would be exactly what he was hoping for. In this instance Polly learned she that not everyone shares mutual respect, and some people intentionally try to hurt each other if it can benefit

Polly, and the other first year students were heading to the moon for a field trip, when the unthinkable happened the piolets fell unconscious. It was quickly discovered by the students that they were drugged, and with no one else on bored the job of piloting fell to Polly, who had the most knowledge of flight, because of her passion for interplanetary travel. After contacting flight control, the attempt to guide the students to the moon base, using the autopilot which should be a routine action, even under their circumstances, which was the situation Stanton prepared for. However, there was catastrophic failure, a hole had ruptured in the aircraft’s engine department. Flight control, quickly has Polly raise the altitude of the aircraft, and told everyone to get in the safety pod to be ejected. Because of the worsening situation inside the aircraft Polly must stay behind, to make sure the aircraft doesn’t spin out of control, so the pod can eject safely. In this instance, Polly learned she would give up everything, even her life, to keep those she cared about safe. Some of her last thoughts of comfort, before passing out was “everyone else had escaped. Charles was alive. It was okay. It was okay” (Vaughn,192). This quote is powerful, because it not only her comforting herself for sacrificing her life for her friends and brother, but it was also her saying