Reading Response 3: Due Tuesday 9/15

Prompt #3: Explain two conflicts that your main character has.  One has to be internal and one has to be external.  Be sure to label the conflicts and support your claim with evidence (Best being quotes; okay being a great paraphrase).  Finally, state which conflict you feel is the most important and why? Anything I underlined is for the purpose of you using it. 

Corey Ryan

Reading Response #3: Conflict

Period 8

September 8, 2015

Background

I am currently on page 148 of Daniel Jose Older’s Shadowshaper.  Sierra Santiago, a Puerto Rican, afro wearing artist is having some pretty weird stuff happen to her.  She begins seeing murals cry.  She begins to notice that even the faces on the murals are contorted.  She sees the murals fade.  Sierra also gets some cryptic messages from her grandfather Lazaro.  All in all…she is a shadowshaper.  There are past members of her family that are shadowshapers also, but they don’t talk about it.  Shadowshapers can draw a picture and bring it to life.  This power helps her fight Professor Wick, who is trying to kill all the shadowshapers.  Of course there is romance too.  Sierra met a boy, Robbie, that is also a great painter and a shadowshaper like Sierra.  No, they haven’t “fallen in love” yet, but I feel it’s coming, that is, if one of them doesn’t get killed.    

The Standards/The Prompt

Sierra’s internal conflict, her person vs. self conflict, is her accepting who she is.  Sierra seems uncomfortable with herself.  “But it was hard work making suggestions and not blatant declarations with her ever-changing Puerto Rican body.  Some days her butt was too big; on others she couldn’t even find it” (page 79).  Here Sierra is doubting her body before she goes on a “date” with Robbie.  Before the quote takes place, Sierra’s Tia Rosa says some racist remarks about her and who she dates.  This also causes her to doubt herself.  Her person vs. self conflict also affects how she feels about her powers.  She isn’t sure about them.  But I’m not far enough in the book to see how her doubt truly affects her in the aspect of shadowshaping.  She’s not sure that the limited “moves” she knows about shadowshaping are enough to defeat Wick and the throng haint. 

Sierra’s external conflict is person vs. supernatural.  This was an easy one because it’s so prominent.  The supernatural element exists on almost every page—even the title.  For example, “The shadow lunged forward and grabbed he wrist, and every cell in Sierra’s body caught fire at the same time.  It’s cool, horrible presence crawled under her skin along her left arm” (page 104). Obviously this is supernatural.  This quote is when the throng haint (a zombie-like figure (corpuscule) that is one body stuffed with many souls and each of these souls speaks) first come and attack Sierra.  She survives, but after this moment, she knows for sure that she is being attacked and she must fight back. 

Sierra’s inner conflict is more important than her supernatural conflict.  Sierra must be okay with who she is in order to defeat Wick and the throng haint and the corpuscules.  If she even doubts herself for a second, the evil ones will destroy her and her family and her friends.  The murals will certainly cry forever…or until the paint disappears. 

My Thinking

This book was written, according to the author, as a sort of “minority” Harry Potter.  I don’t like this book.  But his purpose, it makes me think.  Everyone wants to belong, right?  And everyone needs a hero, someone who looks like them.  So if you love Harry Potter, would you, if you weren’t a white male, love a brown skinned (Puerto Rican) female as your hero? 

Or does it matter?  If the character is great, such as a Harry Potter, does race/gender matter?  This is what I think about. 

I would really like to know what you think. 

And, wait, one more thing.  Every character says, “Imma.”  That’s annoying me.  Does “everyone” really speak like that?  

Anything To Add (not required)

I follow this author on Twitter.  He writes a lot about race.  This book is written for young adults.   The genre would be fantasy. 

I am a white male.  I am 40.  I hate fantasy. 

I am definitely not the audience this author wrote for, so…

I need you, class, to read this after me and tell me what you think about it.  Better yet, follow Daniel Jose Older on Twitter and tweet him your thoughts.