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http://www.npr.org/2017/04/19/524725649/20-years-later-success-for-man-who-imagined-turning-his-life-around

This article is about a man who turned his life around and became a better person. He was a drug dealer and an irresponsible person but he decided enough was enough and turned his life around. Benjamin Campbell had a similar experience. The man in the article turned his life around when all of his friends were getting killed. Ben turned his life around through his experiences in Rough Butte. Both decide that they want to change their life and they both succeed in doing that through hard work.

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17 year old skater. Dark spiky hair. Changes throughout the story, at first he wears skater clothes, by the end he is wearing work pants, work boots, and baseball caps. He smokes throughout the book but quits during it because his girlfriend doesn't like it.

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He works hard, and he helps people even if it risks his own life, he ran into a burning building to save a kid he barely knew. He smokes throughout the book, which shows how his life has been before the story takes place, but quits smoking during the book. He is very disrespectful at first but learns his lesson eventually and becomes a very polite and kind person.

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A lot of people feel a little awkward around him, because they aren’t used to gay people where they live, but they unsuccessfully try to hide it and it makes it more uncomfortable.

Pg. 156 “Somebody somewhere said that you’re supposed to act normal around un-normal things, and everybody just sort of agreed. You have to hide it, you know? So you smile and say what you’re supposed to say, even though everyone is thinking the same thing.”

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He thinks a lot about how he wishes things weren’t so complicated in his family, and how he just wants his dad to act like a dad, and not try to fill in as a mom as well.

You learn that he really cares, and he’s not mad at his dad for being gay, he knows he can’t change that, but he’s mad about how he’s treated sometimes. He just wants his dad to act like his dad and stop telling him what he’s supposed to do and how to act.

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“I opened the door, and through the smoke I saw Billy huddled in the corner. His eyes were closed. I yanked him up and carried him, my shirt falling from my mouth. I couldn’t breathe. My eyes burned and my ears were filled with the dull roar of the flames. I ran to the closest room as the hair on my arms curled up and the heat seared me. My entire body ached. Then I found a window. Without a thought, I dropped Billy, braced my hands on the sill and kicked the glass out, cutting my arms as I frantically cleared the wicked shards. Arm slick with my blood, I picked up Billy’s limp body, the acrid smoke almost smothering me as it poured from the window, and shoved him through. His foot caught on the sill but he tumbled to the grass, then I dove out myself, landing in a heap on top of him.

This shows how he puts other before himself, and is relentless as he’s trying to help people, even risking his own life to do so.

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You can’t change the way people feel about things you can’t control, but you can make them feel differently by what you do and how you act.

I think this because Ben can’t control that his dad is gay, but he is a good person, saves lives, and makes people happy. He earns respect and he is viewed differently by the end of the story.

“Each and every time I sit in the moonlight on the rise overlooking all those dug-up graves, I tell myself I like it here. It fits. I can do something here, and I can be somebody here.

“Dad and Edward had the grand opening of Benjamin’s, and it got rave reviews from the local paper. Great steaks, friendly service, decent prices, and they’re busy. The town seems just fine with them, and I’m glad that I was so incredibly wrong about this place. The people of Rough Butte are good.”

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Ron Jamison is the main antagonist. He is a psycho maniac and is obsessed with Ben’s girlfriend. He was the one that slashed out Mr. Hinks's tires and he enjoys burning animals alive. He tries to burn down Mr. Hinks’s house with Billy inside, but Ben saves him just in time.

“It was a psychological analysis done by a doctor employed by the Montana Highway Patrol. I whistled as I scanned through the mumbo jumbo. Passive-aggressive nature, leanings toward obsessive behavior. Subject lacks empathy for others. Egocentric. Sociopathic tendencies, with a conclusion by the doctor that symptoms would deepen as the subject reached maturity. Shoot. Ron Jamison was one screwed-up cowboy.”

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1. Ben vs. Mr. Hinks.
Ben and Mr. Hinks don’t like each other from the start. Starting because Mr. Hinks is a religious man and Ben’s dad is gay. Ben learns that Mr. Hinks abuses his son Billy and nobody does anything about it, until he comes along. Ben does whatever he can to help Billy and Mr. Hinks hates him for it. Mr. Hinks’s tires are slashed and he immediately blames Ben, even though Ben didn’t do it. This leads to the climax of Ben’s conflict with his dad because he doesn’t believe him when he says he did not do it.

2. Ben vs. his Dad
Ben has always been angry at his dad, not for being gay, but for ruining their family. His mom walked out once his dad said he was gay, and he’s never seen her since. They are constantly fighting and the conflict reaches its climax when Ben is blamed for a crime he didn’t commit, but his dad thinks he did. Eventually it is revealed that Ben didn’t do it and the conflict between the two ends, which both are very happy and relieved about.

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First person.

"I got out of the minivan and a charcoal-gray cat wound its way between my calves, slinking and purring in the late-afternoon sun of Eastern Montana."

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Benjamin Campbell is the protagonist. He starts out as a rebellious skater from the city, who doesn't respect others and is rude to people. He changes for the better in Rough Butte, and learns hard work, respect, and is kind to others. Ben has his struggles, but he tries hard to do the right thing and even risks his life to help people he doesn't even know.

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Rough Butte Montana, a small rural town in Eastern Montana, a very hot and old-fashioned place.

"There's only around four hundred people in Rough Butte, though, so "neighborhood" is more like a few streets with three hundred square miles of nothing surrounding them."

"The wallpaper was a nice flowered pattern from the sixties that made me dizzy, the closet smelled like dusty farts, and the heat was stifling."