Literary Analyses
Here lies the yearbook of analyses I've written for books I've loved. With every book added to my finished file, out will come a new analysis—one's detailing interesting takes, hidden symbolism, and nuanced perspectives!
The Girlfriend by Michelle Frances
Maybe She Was the Crazy Girlfriend, but She Was Right
If you know you are crazy, are you still crazy? If you are self-aware enough to notice the difference in your treatment within society if you go up Ladder A or down Ladder B—are you crazy? Or are you simply aware of how the world will label you the moment you behave outside its expectations? I want to preface by explaining there will be slight spoilers, and if you retain one thing from this analysis, let it be this: if you loved the show’s ending (which you should), don’t read the book. If you hated the show’s ending, read the book! The Girlfriend by Michelle Frances is a psychological thriller novel following a young 27-year-old man named Daniel, his incessant “boy mom” Laura, and his new girlfriend Cherry. While the novel provides insight into the actual retelling of events, the show provides perceptions that amounts to four different characters: Cherry, Cherry from Laura’s point of view, Laura, and Laura from Cherry’s point of view. Combined with a man who avoids conflict and confrontation like the plague, the underlying question is constantly being asked. Who is actually crazy here? Cherry knows how the class system works, knows the image she needs to project, and is willing to act accordingly to rewrite the narrative she was born into. And that—her refusal to remain where she was placed—is what makes her a threat.
The Midnight Feast by Lucy Foley
Take Accountability or The Birds Will
In Lucy Foley’s The Midnight Feast, the countryside town of Tome is embedded with shifty weather, justified locals, buried corpses, and a newly opened all-inclusive hotel: The Manor. Built on land untouched for fifteen-years since the first—and decidedly discreet—Midnight Feast, the grand opening of The Manor invites not only its triple-dollar-sign clientele, but inhabitants of Tome with darkened pasts to be brought aflame. With law enforcement scarce in Tome’s checkered history of blind bribes, locals know it best as the land of The Birds. This invisible group ensure those who dodge accountability meet their reckoning—take accountability or The Birds will. In The Midnight Feast, Foley uses The Birds’ karmic retribution as a symbolic reckoning for those who evade responsibility, urging the necessity of self-reflection. Through multifaceted perspectives, fragmented narration, and relationships rich in double meanings, Foley explores the uneasy, often painful process of reaching a version of yourself you can truly live with.
Milkman by Anna Burns
Where Joy was Forbidden: A Carefully Constructed Nothingness
In Anna Burns’ Milkman, love is not nurtured—it's is surveilled, restricted, and feared. Set in a community where silence is protection and rumor is currency, the novel follows a young woman’s descent into numbness as she is gradually consumed by other people’s stories about her. Yet beneath the gossip and stalking, beneath the political chaos and gendered menace, lies a quieter tragedy: the consistent denial of joy. Particularly for women, to desire intimacy or happiness is to mark oneself as a target—either of ridicule, suspicion, or outright violence. Through the narrator’s repression, her mother’s romantic regret, and the community’s preference for bitterness over fulfillment, Burns argues that gendered control is not only maintained through fear, but through the systematic rejection of emotional pleasure. To want too much, to feel too much, or to hope too much becomes dangerous.
Murphy by Samuel Beckett
The Conflict Between Mind and Body is a River to Existential Torment
The division of mind and body in pursuit of existential peace will lead to nothing but existential torment. In Murphy (both novel and character), author Samuel Beckett demonstrates this relentless conflict between the mind and body as the very source of existential torment rather than peace. Murphy harbors an obsessive search of mental detachment that, not only isolates him from the world, but ultimately leads to his self-destruction. His futile attempts to suppress bodily influence—whether through self-inflicted restraint, philosophical musings, or denial of relationships—further emphasize the pointlessness of escaping the duality of human existence.
The Island of Dr. Moreau by H.G Wells
Christ's Law and Moreau's Bible
The Island of Dr. Moreau encapsulates a world in which an island, run by Dr. Moreau, is populated almost completely by Beast Folk. Despite their insatiable animalistic impulse to run freely and hunt prey, the Beast Folk lead peaceful lives in their civilization. This civilized society is a result of The Law; a system of rules and beliefs devised by Dr. Moreau to dictate the behavior of the Beast Folk. Similar to how Christ is idealized in Christianity, Moreau is idealized and deified through the Law, giving his followers someone to aspire to and someone to serve. The Law is the religion that follows the bases of Christianity, however there is no free will in this system. If Beast Folk are to disobey The Law, they are sent to the House of Pain. Dr. Moreau uses The Law as a religious tool to oppress the Beast Folk; by portraying Dr. Moreau’s manipulation of religion to control the Beast Folk, Wells suggests the cautionary tale of exploiting faith and obedience for oppressive purposes.
Einstein's Dreams by Alan Lightman
Free Will on a Clock's Leash: The Illusion of Choice
The relationship between human and time has always varied depending on who you ask. Ask a 10-year-old boy and he would most likely tell you that time was moving far too slow. Ask a 100-year-old woman and she might just tell you how time had moved far too quick. Ask a philosopher and they would ask you what you consider “time.” Consult a clock and it will mock you by ticking on and on in response. Time is one of the few concrete constants we know to exist. No matter the situation, or how much you plead with the sky begging for time to stop, it will not adhere to your request. Time, ironically, is like a god in the way it determines your fate but limits the free will you already have. Many of Einstein’s Dreams chapters question how much control people can really have over their lives given that the passage of time continues without their control. In all of the dream worlds embedded in the novel, time determines an individual’s free will. Different from the world we inhabit today, the alternate realities of these dream worlds hold different concepts of time.
