Alexandra Turley

Book Review #1

Period 4

October 30, 2016

　

The Outsiders

S.E. Hinton
                                                                                                                                                                                                  Fiction
                                                                                                                                                                                                180 pages
                                                                                                                                                                                                        Margaret Edwards Award

　

             The novel, The Outsiders, by S.E. Hinton, is about a boy named Ponyboy Curtis and his struggles with feeling like an outsider. The boys are greasers, a term that means the boys on the East Side, the poor side of town. The greasers' enemies are the Socs, short for Socials, who are the West-side rich kids. It all starts with Ponyboy walking home from the movies and gets stopped by the Socs and is beaten pretty badly. Soon after his brothers and their friends come to the rescue and chase the Socs off. Ponyboy's only family are his two brothers, Darry and Soda because his parents died in a car accident. Darry is harder on Ponyboy than Ponyboy would like and Soda is more of the friendly, laidback brother. One night Ponyboy and his friend Johnny fell asleep in an empty lot. When he woke, he raced home to find Darry awake and waiting. Darry was furious, and in the anger of the moment slapped Ponyboy. Ponyboy ran back to lot with Johnny to get away from his brothers, then they see a group of Socs approuching. They hold Ponyboy under the water in the fountain. Johnny doesn't know what to do so he pulls out a switch blade and kills a Soc named Bob. Ponyboy and Johnny look for help from Dally in leaving to avoid being arrested for Bob's murder. He gives them $50 and a place to go outside of town. The boys get on a train and find the place where they wait until Dally comes to get them. Hiding in an abandoned church, they both cut their hair, and Pony dies his hair to not be recognized by the police. They pass the time in the church playing cards and reading out loud from "Gone With the Wind". Dally shows up after a week, and takes them to the Dairy Queen in Windrixville. Johnny decides that he has a batter chance now, and decides that he wants to turn himself in. They head back to the church and discover that it is on fire. A school group is there, on an outing, and little kids are trapped inside. Without thinking, Ponyboy and Johnny go inside and rescue the kids. As they are handing the kids outside to Dally, the burning roof collapses. Ponyboy almost didn't escape. A piece of wood fell on Johnny, burning him badly and breaking his back. The boys, now seen as heroes, are taken by an ambulance back to town, where Pony meets up with his brothers. Johnny died because his injuries were to severe, and Dally is so sad he then robbs a store and gets caught he is then shot by the police.


One of my favorite things in The Outsiders is how close all the boys are. An example of this was when Ponyboy was getting beaten up by the group of Socs and all the boys jumped in to help. Or when the Socs where drowning Ponyboy, Johnny even killed a man for him. I also think its amazing how they all know when enough is enough for eachother. By this I mean they all know what to say and what not to say. A few things I didn't like about this book was how their names were Ponyboy and Sodapop. I felt like I couldnt really get to know them because the names were unpersonal and to humorous to take seriously. Other than that I loved this book, it was so intense yet understandable. I dont really know how iI feel about the end of this book. I was so mad, and cried a little when Johnny died, but i knew something was going to happen to someone so I was somewhat okay with that. Except when Dally died out of the blue I was furious, at him and S.E. Hinton. I would recomend this book to readers because I am not someone that loves to read and I really liked this book. It was a lot to take in but not confusing. It also really teaches the value of friendship and doing whats wright is better than doing nothing at all. Here are some of my favorite quotes from the book because they really show how much they both cared for one another.,"You take up for your buddies, no matter what they do. When you're a gang, you stick up for the members. If you don't stickup for them, stick together, make like brothers, it isn't a gang any more. It's a pack. A snarling, distrustful, bickering pack like the Socs in their social clubs or the street gangs in New York or the wolves in the timber.",We're all we've got left. We ought to be able to stick together against everything. If we don't have each other, we don't have anything. If you don't have anything, you end up like Dallas, and I don't mean dead, either. I mean like he was before. And that's worse than dead."