I chose The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie as my coming-of-age book. There are a lot of identity crises involved in the life of Native American main character Arnold. Now that I'm halfway through, and I've made inferences and observations about what makes Arnold tick, I'm ready to type them up and share them with you.
Arnold starts of unlike most characters in coming of age books. Most characters are too ignorant of the world, and need to know that bad things do happen in it. By the falling action, they've witnessed or learned about some horrific act of violence or moral void. Then they strive to go on living their lives, processing that information and dealing with it. In this, they start to mature and become adults. Arnold, however, starts in the opposite, and follows more the plot line of a Disney movie. Arnold's life starts out badly. He grows up on a Native American reservation where lots of adults are drunk, unemployed, and underfed. His dog is shot to put it out of its misery. Nothing seems to be going Arnold's way, so he just accepts that he will be treated like a second-class citizen all of his life. He will have no job, and probably become an alcoholic, like the example that has been set for him.
Suddenly, Arnold's life is flipped upside down (sound familiar?) and he starts attending an upper-class school with a white majority of students. He's not accepted. He's not even tolerated by anyone but the teachers. Some days he has to walk a few miles home by himself because his dad fails to pick him up. He's bullied and beat up. His life went from bad to worse. He thought his life was turning up when his academics were prep-school worthy. But it turns out he just has to go through one more of life's hoops, and that's just until he graduates. Will he ever get a break?
I don't know--I'm only halfway through. But I'll find out. And then I'll tell you about it!
