Cassie’s Comments (group member since Mar 20, 2016)

Cassie’s comments from the Last but not Least group.

Gill I like how you said that it was the blue mans time to die and Eddie's time to live. I noticed this happens a lot throughout the novel. Tala died so Eddie could live, and the captain did the same. Also, Eddie died to save the little girl at ruby pier. This might be an extension of the theme of sacrifice, but Im curious to see if anyone has a different interpretation.

Val I think that is a really good point. It's pretty ironic that it is his job to keep the rides safe, yet a broken ride is what kills him. I'm not too sure what the significance is, but maybe it serves to emphasize the idea that after the war Eddie truly got stuck at the pier, and that was in fact where he was meant to be.

I think the little girl at the end was the most important. He truly felt that he wasted his life by staying at the pier and Tala teaches him that he had done the exact opposite. The fact that he couldn't save her during the war was heartbreaking, but it is almost as if his job in keeping the children of Ruby pier safe makes up for it. Especially the little girl he ends up saving. Tala dies to keep Eddie alive and Eddie died to save the girl at the pier, so in the end they were the same. Personally, I thought it was the Tala who helped Eddie come to terms with every part of his life, both good and bad, and also helped him understand why things turned out the way they did.

Honestly, I do think he was right to shoot Eddie. It was the captains job to keep him alive and he probably would have died in the fire. I also think that the captain believed that the little girl was an imaginary outgrowth of Eddie's exhaustion because, as Maria mentioned, the war was getting to all of them. In that situation, the captain was not going to risk losing Eddie to save the life of a child that may or may not have been real.
Also, while he couldn't save the child in the fire, if Eddie wasn't alive, he would have never saved the child at the pier who, in a way, brings the story full circle.

Maria, I like that you said the flashbacks allow the reader to make sense of events that happened during Eddie's childhood. When Eddie meets the blue man in heaven he is told why he is there:
The Blue Man says, "This is the greatest gift God can give you: to understand what happened in your life. To have it explained. It is the peace you have been searching for" (35).
To me, this quote explains the importance of the flashbacks and brings the reader into the story by showing that Eddie will learn the significance of these events, and the reader will learn their meaning along with him.

I agree with Maria. I think he serves more to bring out the theme than as a symbol. That being said I want to add to Maria's theme. I think that, not only does it show how events interconnect, but also how people interconnect. He shows that everyone you meet has an effect on your life and that you will have an effect on theirs, whether or not you realize it at the moment. I also think that maybe he serves to show how an insignificant moment in one person's life can be the most significant moment in another's.

I agree too, and I was also wondering if anyone else thought that the fact that he doesn't like teenagers is significant. I may be over analyzing this, but like Maria pointed out he did go to war and maybe his hard feelings toward them are a reflection of a bad experience during his teenaged years. I was just curious what you guys thought.

I think that Eddie seems almost disappointed with the way his life turned out at the pier. He goes about his monotonous routine lacking the childlike optimism that surrounds him. This is emphasized when he silently scoffs at his young co-worker's positive and lively attitude, and again when he thinks of "how strange it was to be growing old in a place that smelled of cotton candy" (6). Eddie's past is also mentioned, but in brief notes that lack detail which makes me think that as Eddie passes through heaven we will learn more about what made him the way he is. Also, like Maria said, I think it will be more of a somber tone, especially considering the book centers around the death of a kind, yet unhappy, old man.