I Am the Messenger Themes

Can we see some ID? The crisis of identity is at the core of I Am the Messenger. As the main character learns from a series of cards and assignments, he sees his own identity changing. Ed knows he'...

A mystery man shows up at your house with a folder and claims "It's all in there […] Everything I wrote for you" (5.the folder.13). Um, okay. We might start to freak out because we'd have a bunch...

In 1933, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, then a new president of the United States, said that the "only thing we have to fear is fear itself." It's a little more eloquent than Piggy's "I know there isn'...

Love makes us do crazy things, like kiss one of our friends when she isn't interested in us. When Ed kisses Audrey out of the blue, we know things won't end well for him, but if romantic comedies h...

Disappointment in I Am the Messenger is all about the painful experience of finding out that what you thought was possible was nothing but a pipe dream. If you're lucky, you get over it, but not so...

Courage in I Am the Messenger is not a feeling but a way that you behave. Although you might feel frightened or sick, you can still behave bravely, you still choose to act. Ed doesn't become unafra...

There are a lot of big head-scratching nail-biting philosophical questions posed in I Am the Messenger. Ed thinks about what his life amounts to and how he compares to other people who are his age,...

Remember when you were little and your mom warned you to tell the truth, or else your pants would burst into flames? When you grew up a little, you realized the truth is much more complex than simp...