Literary Devices in Autobiography of My Dead Brother
Symbolism, Imagery, Allegory
Setting
Jesse and his friends live in Harlem, a New York City neighborhood, and that's where all the action takes place. We know from the outset that it's a really violent area: "My dad said that the main...
Narrator Point of View
Our narrator is Jesse Givens, a fifteen-year old with a lot on his mind and no one to really share it with. Since his BFF Rise has transformed into someone he hardly feels like he knows, and he's a...
Genre
Like many other coming-of-age stories, Autobiography of My Dead Brother is a young adult novel. (After all, young adults are the people generally going through the whole coming-of-age experience.)...
Tone
Jesse is just fifteen years old, but he's already been to more than his fair share of funerals. The New York City neighborhood he lives in is extremely dangerous and super scary, which is made crys...
Writing Style
A lot of times in books and movies you'll see teenage boys stereotyped as almost mute, speaking in grunts and one-word sentences. Not these guys, though. Jesse and his friends—especially Rise—h...
What's Up With the Title?
This one's a doozy, so pay attention: Autobiography of My Dead Brother is a novel, not an autobiography, and it's about a friend, not a brother. Holy misleading titles, Batman.Okay, not really. Ins...
What's Up With the Ending?
There's a terrible symmetry to this book in that it ends the exact same way it began: with a funeral for a young black teenager who's been shot to death. It's almost uncanny because there's the sam...
Tough-o-Meter
(3) Base Camp Autobiography of My Dead Brother dives deep into some dark and difficult emotions, so thankfully the writing itself describes all the emotional chaos very clearly, making sure readers...
Plot Analysis
Best Friends Forever?Jesse and Rise have been besties their whole lives, ever since Jesse was one and Rise was three. So sweet, right? Not so fast: Now that they're teenagers, Jesse worries they're...
Trivia
Some writers have a hard time meeting their daily quota. Not Walter Dean Myers—he restricted himself to just five pages a day of new writing. And he was often finished by 10:00AM. (Source.) Myers...
Steaminess Rating
Jesse knows he's inexperienced when it comes to sex—what he doesn't know is that his girlfriend Tania is a prostitute. (Dude's really naive.) When she asks if he wants to fool around, he feels "m...
Allusions
Historical ReferencesMalcolm X (10.41)Huey Newton (14.25)The Black Panthers (14.25)Muhammad Ali (14.33)Haile Selassie (11.2)Pop Culture References"Take My Hand, Precious Lord" (gospel song)John Col...