Despite all of the struggles that she faces, Precious is incredibly resilient and strong. Precious’ first child, Mongo, lives with her maternal great-grandmother, Shelia. Mongo has Down’s syndrome and has developmental delays because of it. Mary (Precious’ mother) does not work, nor does she want to. She receives food stamps and other forms of aid through manipulating the welfare system by saying that Mongo lives in the apartment with she and Precious, when in reality, Mongo lives with her great grandmother.
What makes it so good is the interaction between characters and the unique language style. The family and the characters in What's Eating Gilbert Grape might be strange, but they seem like real characters with real emotions, for the author successfully gives each of them a vivid depiction. Arnie is about to turn eighteen, but mentally, he is like a five-year-old. He always has traces of some food on his face, and when he feels like it, he climbs up on the water tower, or catches grasshoppers and chops off their heads. He never listens to his brother or sister, and always makes trouble for them.
Connie’s Escape Connie is fifteen and is always worried about how her appearance looks. Her mother don't like the fact she spends more time looking her self herself in the mirror then being neat and responsible like June, her older sister. Connie seems to ignores her mother’s criticisms most of the time. In order to escape her reality she opens the screen door to get away for from her family and be in some kind of fantasy. I think there were other reasons also, but the story points to this one in many places.
At home her mother would always be very distant and would constantly talk about her past as a teenager and how popularity is very important which would get even worse later in the book to the point where she totally isolates herself from people and gets sent to an institution. Geri started to drink more and stopped talking to her two best and only friends Carolyn and BJ to join another group of friends who were “cooler” and would always drink and throw partys. Geri eventually became an alcoholic and would be drinking every single day which was a choice of hers. Nobody forced Geri to drink and after everytime a terrible event would happen she would always promise herself she’d never do it again but then when she felt low she would just start small and go back up. The point of this is that the events such as her families situation could have been solved if she had put effort into it but instead she began drinking which was her choice and she had total control over
He is abused and beaten severely but he has a will to live and he does everything he can to survive his mother’s wrath. David’s school nurse knows of what David’s mother does to her but when she tells him she wants to call the police, David begs her not to because he knows that if he goes home he will have to undergo the most unimagineable punishments. He was abused all of his childhood to the point that he wasn’t living, he was surviving, and he was struggling to do
Marla: All I remember from my childhood is hearing my mother yelling through the walls that I shared with them, or seeing her with a black eye or broken arm and not being able to take care of me; while my father takes off for couple of days or a week. I cannot recall ever having a family dinner with my parents that was argument free and heard laughter. Clinician (Dardree): How was the relationship between your parents? Marla: The relationship between my parents was toxic, but my mother loved him a lot. Now that I’m older, I think about it and still cannot understand why she did.
She isn’t the traditional American house wife that watches the children, cook meals, and wash and make clothes for the family. Ma Joad keeps all of her emotions to herself and hates family separation. She is Strong, hopeful, willful, and unbreakable and the most valuable supporter of the family during the period of hard times. Ma Joad as a main Character of the book drives her family into spiritual survival. All characters in The Grapes of Wrath bear moment's of deep self disappointment; however, Ma does not create a chance for them to stumble.
She was only seventeen, an empty look in her eyes and a worn expression showing on her pale still plump from baby fat face. From across the clinic she felt eyes that were not only my own criticizing her as her toddler scream ruthlessly at her helpless calming words while one hand lay hopeless on her swollen belly. This is not the first young girl the world has witnessed alone and dreamless because of a few rowdy minutes with a boy. This is an example of a never ending epidemic that seems cannot be stopped. Children having children, grandparents raising their grandchildren while the mother or father run wild trying to live the youthful life they forfeited recklessly.
There were times where Bone recalls “afterward, Mama would cry and wash my face and tell me not to be so stubborn, not to make him so mad” (Allison 110) which places the blame completely on Bone. I think the biggest factor into engagement was Anney’s refusal to leave Glen even after she knew, Bone’s lack of identity, the pre-existing idea that the family was trash, and her constant desire to please her mother even telling her mother “I could never hate you” after she witnesses the abuse. As Bone gets older she finds even more reason to blame herself for the abuse. She even blames her looks saying that her ugliness explains why Daddy Glen is
A sibling will be the one you are ready to kill one minute and can't live without the next. We go through everything in life together and are still there for one another even when times are the worst imaginable or amazingly wonderful. It is like no other relationship a person will ever have. I thank God I have my sister, Jana, but there are those who are not fortunate enough to have siblings. I taught Jana how to drive a stick shift and laughed at her because she didn't know how to boil water.