… books, both assigned and independently chosen. However, it wasn’t until the last independent reading study of the semester that I finally found a book that compelled me to its storyline and characters, as well as challenged me to understand the author’s…

… Wrath” is about a family from Oklahoma migrating to California. The Joad family wanted to find a better life because they were living through the Great Depression. They suffer from econonical hardship. They had lost their farm because they had no…

… major theme that occur in the novel, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn is education. This is seen through Johnny and Katie Nolan and Mary Rommely in which they all agree that education is the way out for the Nolan children. For instance, Mary does not know when…

… or short story engaged in one goal. To simply read the work for its face value and mere words printed on paper to reach the climactic and almost certain moral value that we hope all stores will have in the end. Consider the following passage by Wolfgang…

… comes into contact with a yam vendor. As the sweet scent of yams reaches the Invisible Man's nose, they "[brought] a stab of swift nostaligia." This wonderful smell takes the narrator back to a time when he was young and with his loved ones. The…

… property, money, and innocence. The loss of innocence unravels the very core of existence. Prior to World War I, Paul Baumer’s character enjoyed his youthful exuberance, yet as the war progresses, his naivete vanishes and he becomes hardened by…

… examined separately seem to be totally unrelated books about completely different subjects. They chronicle the lives of two very different people in quite different circumstances. The novels appear to be in all ways the opposite of one another. Their…

… to familiarize us with the setting, using poetic imagery to describe the "golden foothill slopes" (1) of the Salinas River Valley and a particular pool on the banks of which "the leaves lie deep and so crisp that a lizard makes a great skittering if…

… the story of an affluent businessman, Sherman McCoy, and how his life enters a downward spiral after a hit and run accident. The Bonfire of the Vanities takes place in New York City in the late nineteen eighties. Sherman is a thirty-eight year old…

… in Adelaide and then moved to Darwin to finish his education. Since graduating in medicine from the University of Adelaide, he has devoted his time equally to medicine and writing. He is married to a fellow graduate and they have three children. I…