Genre
A dystopia
Setting and Context
The events of the novel take place in the near future. It is dystopian America which is obsessed with youth, social networks, beauty and money. The economic crisis threatens to plunge the county into chaos. In spite of all the problems and troubles, 39-year-old Lenny Abramov falls in love with 24-year-old Eunice Park.
Narrator and Point of View
The story is told from the first point of view either by Lenny Abramov or Eunice Park.
Tone and Mood
A tone of the story changes from cheery and hopeful to desperate. A mood is uneasy.
Protagonist and Antagonist
Lenny Abramov is the protagonist of the story; the dystopian society is the antagonist of the story.
Major Conflict
The major conflict is person vs. society. Lenny Abramov fails to find his place in the society whose main obsession is youth and money.
Climax
The financial collapse of the USA is the climax of the story.
Foreshadowing
A body at the chronological age of thirty-nine already racked with too much LDL cholesterol, too much ACTH hormone, too much of everything that dooms the heart, sunders the liver, explodes all hope.
This quote shows how different Lenny is from his countrymen. He is aging badly and there is nothing that he can do about it.
Understatement
I just have to be good and I have to believe in myself. I just have to stay off the trans fats and the hooch. I just have to drink plenty of green tea and alkalinized water and submit my genome to the right people. I will need to re-grow my melting liver, replace the entire circulatory system with “smart blood,” and find someplace safe and warm (but not too warm) to while away the angry seasons and the holocausts.
Lenny says it as if it is the easiest thing in the world, but he doesn’t mention how expensive it is.
Allusions
The novel alludes to Whitney Huston, The Pantheon, Michelangelo Merisi de Caravaggio, Anton Chekhov, the Soviet Union, Joseph Stalin, George Orwell.
Imagery
Is used a lot for characters descriptions
Paradox
A week ago, before Eunice gave me reason to live, you wouldn’t have noticed me, diary. A week ago, I did not exist.
Lenny is 39 years old, so he has been existing for some time and it has nothing to do with Eunice.
Parallelism
Never, never, never, never.
Metonymy and Synecdoche
The bald man known as “Cancer Boy” followed dejectedly on the hills of the Afghani princess to whom he had given his heart. (A heart is metonymy which stands for love.)
He’s the reason we’re in Venezuela right now. (We are synecdoche which stands for the US army.)
Personification
Plane’s wheels finally licked the tarmac.
