Unwind Essay

Neal Shusterman's 2007 novel, Unwind, follows a literary realism story about the concept of unwinding. It features three main characters, Connor, Risa, and Lev who are teenagers set to be unwound. Neal Shusterman uses a third person perspective and involves multiple narrators, differentiating each character's response to their unfair life. Lev calder was raised a tithe and his entire life he'd been brainwashed that he was a chosen one. While on the run for his life, Lev encounters a range of people, every person putting something new into Lev's mind. These new ideas in Lev's head then begin taking control of his actions and emotions. In later stages of the novel, Lev is left hesitating before and regretting after his every action. He begins

Using multiple narrators and imaging, Shusterman has created a strong contrast between Lev’s two personalities. In his thirteen years, Lev has been strongly influenced and manipulated by the society which he has grown up in. He was raised where ‘rules’ and values were put into his head which caused him to have little experience in making his own decisions. Early on Lev was a foolish person who followed instruction without question, but after being abandoned from every direction, he's hesitant in choosing a title for himself. Lev's mind is blank and he's allowing society to transform him into a new person, “Lev needed someone who could fill his head with ideas, to replace the life-time of ideas that had been taken away from him”. After his interaction with julie-anne Lev’s mind has been hardened and “transformed in some deep and frightening way”. He doesn't know how to respond to this overpowering anger burning inside of him. His anger pushes him into a box he's never entered before, and a box that he can't seem to get out of. When Lev looks at himself, he sees the Lev he has been turned into, not necessarily the lev he wants to be. “-maybe then he'd have chosen a different path. But for who he is now, for what he feels and what he doesn't feel, the path is right. And if it's not right, well, he doesn't care enough

Through this outburst, Shusterman has created a strong image signifying Lev's monstrous yet heroic actions. In this example here, Lev is being heroic in a monstrous way. He has been washed over with burning anger that he can't control, and while this outburst isn't a respectful way to get the message across, Lev is being courageous and helping his friend. His actions here would be seen and monstrous to the parents and the police, but from Ci-fi’s view, "Thank you," Cy says. "Thank you . . .", Lev is being a hero. Later on in the novel, Lev's final decision of becoming a clapper would be seen as monstrous by the government and majority of society, but from all the unwinds point of view he would be seen as a hero with his effort to essentially save them. While becoming a clapper is not a good decision to make "it's all led to this. For years, Unwinds were just faceless kids that no one wanted—but now you've put a face on unwinding”, It has woken up society and led to greater ideas being arisen. From the perspective of all the people who have a connection with unwinding, this is a positive change, but for all the juvey cops and the government it would be seen as monstrous. With all the conflicting opinions, determining one name for someone is impossible. Someone could do the greatest good in the world, but there would still be people who see them as a monster or vice