Charlie on the way his mother speaks 

 

Sarcasm is known as the lowest form of wit, "Droll Wit", meaning 'dry humour' is an excuse made my Charlie's father. From the last sentence, "...more or less an opportunity to get up my 🤬 without appearing unreasonable." This shows that Charlie analyses his mother on the way she speaks and acts towards Charlie. This quote acknowledges that Charlie is detecting his mothers attitudes in the way she speaks and her attitudes towards not only Charlie, but her husband too. Charlie analysing his mother represents the theme of appearances VS  reality as it is not very lady-like to speak like that. 

- jelena 

I think that the note i got, ("he stands up, tall and intimidation. He glares with real anger.") I think that this is characterisation because the character is feeling anger and trying to intimidate the other person. 

Alex Self

Quotes "I got somethink real to be afraid of" and "I know you unnerstand what I bin saying" in the book, said by Japer Jhones, show how jasper is not very educated and how and he may be used to more 'Australian' slang, as he probably didn't go to school. By jasper saying Somethink, unnerstand and bin we can infer that he doesn't really take much pride in the way he portrays himself. It also shows us how different jasper is compared to Charlie.

Jake And Vincentt

It feels as though I'm inhabited by a teeming metropolis of insects, trailing up and down my limbs and my neck. Burrowing under my skin. And they won't be shuddered or away. p.326 

 

At this point of the book, Charlie has learnt that Jack has had nothing to do with Laura's murder. However using his intuition, he was able to notice that Eliza had been hiding something and that something would be revealed once she had finally led him and Jasper to the tree. He knew it couldn't be good because there was no good reason for Laura's murder, it probably would've been more comforting to Charlie to know there was no reason and that it was just some psycho but Charlie needed to grow up. The insects represent fear as he's about to face something he doesn't want to. This positions the audience to believe something bad might happen or be revealed, telling us, the audience that Charlie is feeling uncomfortable and afraid whilst provoking a higher sense of mystery which begs the audience/us to ask the question that was/we asked at the start of the book and throughout; who killed Laura Wishart and why? 

Charlie and Jasper talk about courage in superheroes and if superman is courageous or not. After the argument Charlie reads a book with the quote Courage is a resistance of fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear. The quote means that fear doesn't go away and courage means you conquer or ignore that fear.  It is only when fear becomes obsessive, and we allow fear to control us, that fear becomes a problem. 

As Charlie is naïve and innocent he is very unaware when it comes to sex so it comes as a shock when Charlie finds out that Warwick Trent has sex more than one time. This is reiterated throughout the whole book as Charlie's encounters with many real world problems like when he found out about Laura's death and his mothers affair. This is a use of diction as Silvey's choice of wording allows the reader to understand Charlie's stance. Diction allows you understand a characters characteristics as this short extract shows you how Charlie is a very shy person. 

 

Craig Silvey uses aesthetic features like representation to position the audience to understand the important issues in the book through a subtle prompt. The quote above utilises superheroes as a motif. The sentence 'the more you have to lose, the braver you are for standing up', in the context of superheroes can also be contextualised to the town of Corrigan and the situation between Jasper and Charlie about going to the police about Laura Wishart or keeping it a secret. The sentence in the quote 'he can put those fears aside and fight on regardless', when Charlie says this he is relating this to him being afraid of the predicament with Laura Wishart. This quote can be attached to the theme of ' Understanding, innocence and sympathy'. 
- Kharli and Amelia