The Goldfinch You’ve just lost the person you care about most in the world. The person you clung to when you were scared, the person who comforted you, the person who loved you unconditionally. Your mother. And the only thing you have to remember her by is the last thing she looked at. The Goldfinch is a tale about a boy named Theo Decker, who has to deal with change, grief, and facing his own inner demons. It’s a tale that is worthy of the Pulitzer awarded to it, and it will make you think differently about the people of the world. Before Theo’s mother died, he was just a normal eighth-grader living in a tiny Manhattan apartment with his mother. Strapped for cash most of the time, they usually ate Chinese take-out, and frequented the museum …show more content…
When he was still in New York, all Theo wanted to do was lay around and watch old movies, something his mother liked to do. When he was finally forced to go back to school, he just kind of drifted, like a specter. He hardly ever cried, he just let his feeling bubble and fester, until they burst forth at random intervals, whether through tears, or screaming, or just making him freeze on the spot as he was hit with wave after wave of painful memories. None of which are healthy options. When he was reunited with his father, he was introduced to substances such as drugs and alcohol, his father himself introducing him to the latter. Theo also meets new people who encourage him to partake in such substances. In Nevada, there are no sweet souls or guardian angels such as Pippa or Hobie, only druggies like Boris, who lead him down an even darker path of substance abuse. If Theo’s mother hadn’t died in that museum, it would have been better for everybody. They just would have kept on living the simple, happy life that they shared together. However, after Theo’s father died, he only saw it as an opportunity to get back to Manhattan. Whether that was he didn’t care, he was already grieving for one lost parent, or simply because the realization hadn’t sunk in yet, he didn’t take it the same way he took his mother’s death; hard. Overall, despite the extraordinary circumstances in which he finds himself in, Theo has a …show more content…
Theo actually spends so much time trying to forget life before his mother’s death, that he starts to forget who he was as a person as well. The only thing that helps him remember is The Goldfinch. The only trouble is, there are a countless number of things that help him forget, and only one thing that helps him remember. As Theo gets older, he remembers less and less of his old life, and chooses only to focus on his new, ‘good’ life. Then, he hits a point as a young man, and he turns around and tries to recover all his memories. But it’s like looking for a lost contact, once it’s gone, it’s virtually impossible to get it back. When he was young, he took having those memories for granted, and as an adult, he tries desperately to get them back and rebuild bridges with people that he burned eons ago… Once you give yourself completely over to someone or something else, it can feel like the hardest thing in the world trying to become independent again. What I guess I’m trying to get at is, don’t do drugs,