How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #7
Twice in two days. I could lose a month's worth every three months or so, like I had been since freshman year, but I couldn't f***ing lose it every f***ing two f***ing days […] She couldn't keep doing this.
But if I could stop her I'd already have stopped her.
How could she steal that much of my f***ing life? (13.82-84)
We're just going to come out and say it: We here at Shmoop have reviewed the situation and frankly, we think Karl has been outstandingly patient with his mom given all he has to put up with. We can't really condone fits of profanity, but since this is a novel and Karl is a fictional character, we totally get why he ends up at this point.
Quote #8
Huck would have been a Madman, for sure, if he'd gone to our school, I can tell you that. His dad was a drunk who was beating him, and kidnapped him, and threatened to kill him, and everybody in that town knew what was happening—the only people he could trust were other kids. And them not very much. (16.158)
If there's one thing John Barnes does an awesome job of in this book, it's showing how literature is immortal. One hundred years after its publication, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn is still more than relevant to Karl's life. Which makes us ask—as you're reading this novel that takes place in the past, do the events still feel relevant to you?
Quote #9
"Now and then, when he's been fighting with his dad and is really strung out, Paul goes up on the gay stroll in Toledo. Usually it happens after Paul's dad gets on his ass for not being all manly and stuff. Like whenever Paul gets a lot of attention, say, when he has a big part in a play, or a solo in a choir concert, or when it's a home game and he's the drum major for the halftime show, Mr. Knauss catches Paul afterward and tells him he's embarrassed the whole family by being Mister Big Public Screaming F*****, and yells at Paul, and usually tells him to never come home and locks him out that night." (17.30)
Being a gay teenager in the early 1970s was way different than it is now. While Paul's dad is clearly abandoning his son, his behavior was probably par for the course for parents of teens who identified as gay at the time. Really, it's too bad Paul couldn't have been around in the 2010s instead of the 1970s. With his musical abilities, he would have fit right in on Glee.