Notifications
Clear all
Perspective Discussion #3
4
Posts
4
Users
0
Reactions
91
Views
Topic starter
02/04/2026 9:49 am
The Sun Is Also a Star by Nicola Yoon is about two teenagers, Natasha Kingsley and Daniel Bae, who meet during one important day in New York City. Natasha is very practical and believes in science and facts. She is trying to stop her family from being deported back to Jamaica, so she doesn’t believe in fate or love. But Daniel is romantic and believes in things happening for a reason. He is also dealing with pressure from his parents, who want him to choose a traditional career instead of following his dream of becoming a poet. When Natasha and Daniel meet in New York, Daniel thinks their meeting is meant to be, but Natasha believes it is just a coincidence. As they spend the day together, they talk about love, destiny, and their futures. During their time together, they begin to form a strong connection that makes Natasha question what she believes and makes both of them think about what really shapes their lives. Natasha finds out the lawyer failed, so she’s still getting deported. Daniel goes with her to the airport, and they confess they love each other before she leaves. Years later, they’ve moved on, but by chance, they meet again on a flight, suggesting fate brings them back together
Where in your story are characters struggling with the expectations of people around them? Where do they end up?
02/04/2026 11:38 am
Where in your story are characters struggling with the expectations of people around them? Where do they end up?
In the book out of nowhere the book is about a high scholar named tom who lives in a small town in maine he starts to change when lots of somali immigrants that move to his town and play soccer and john the soccer team in the beginning tom dosnt understand them and has a negative attitude about it but then he has to do community services his attitude starts to change he starts to get to know one of the Somali families he starts to understand how unfairly they are treated but now he understands how un fair there treated and changes his attitude about them
To answer the question yes tom struggles with the pressure of his friends and how they should act and treat the Somali immigrants for example “could we have a three, a five, and an eight?and a side of sambusas,please ? Mylamyla said to the skinny guy. He nodded punched numbers into his register. He pointed to the case where we could get bottled drinks.”(pg183)
03/04/2026 2:52 pm
Sol sets high expectations for herself in the beginning of the book, and when she shows she can achieve them, people around her start setting them too. She wants to do things like getting a job, and going to school, so she can brighten her future. Things that will result from this would be saving the restaurant her family owns, and getting into a good college. She sets herself up to be strong all the time, to make everyone think of her as this strong, grown up girl. “I’ts all much simpler than I used to think-- finding the strength that is buried deep within me, and doing things that once seemed impossible” (Aleman 308). She had to find the strength she had built, from having all the expectations weighing her down.
10/04/2026 11:19 am
The book, The Poet X, by Elizabeth Acevedo, is about a young Dominican girl named Xiomara, (X for short) making her way through high school and learning the feeling of freedom she gets through poetry. She starts out, always on edge, having to defend herself or her brother from harassment. She wrote her poems in secret, locking her true self away in ink splattered pages, hiding. She struggles a lot with the expectations of her Mami (Mom). X’s mom is an incredibly religious woman, and she’s trying to get X to follow her footsteps, but X just can’t seem to get on the same page. She doesn’t identify with their religion. It almost seems incompatible with their life. The book reads, “When I look around the church/ And none of the depictions of angels/ Or Jesus or Mary, not one of the disciples/ Look like me: morenita and big and angry.” (Acevedo 59). This quote shows how she almost looks at them like they aren’t human. Their perfect, saintly lives are not the same as hers, like they don’t understand her, and she doesn’t understand them. Towards the end of the book, after X continues to butt heads with her mother on routine issues, she finally gets the confidence and joins her school's poetry club. The club makes her and her words feel valued and powerful. She moves on to reading at the big New York Citywide youth poetry slam, where she gets huge applause. Her family and friends are in the audience, even her Mami, who never liked her poetic tendencies, calling them hurtful, and dangerous. They go home and celebrate and Mami says to her, “Pa’lante, Xiomara./
Que para atrás ni para coger impulso.” (Acevedo 355). (Translated: Onward!
Never look back—not even to gather momentum.) This quote shows how Mami is now more in support of X and her poetry, allowing her to feel loved, and to be her true self, the poet, X.
