36 pages • 1 hour read
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Symbols & Motifs
Purple Hair Clip
Lake’s purple hair clip initially symbolizes her father; later, it symbolizes both of her parents. When Lake, Kel, and their mother, Julia, are leaving their beloved ranch in Texas and Lake is reflecting on memories of her late father, she picks up a purple hair clip from under the fridge and remembers her father claiming it had magical powers. When Lake strokes her mother’s hair and strands fall out (due to Julia’s chemotherapy), she keeps them in her hair clip; it now represents both of her parents. Before she professes her love for Will, she wears the hair clip. She seeks the support of both of her parents for this important moment.
Pink Balloons
The pink balloons present at Eddie’s birthday party symbolize an important shift in her life. Initially, pink balloons remind her of her birth mother, whose substance abuse caused her to act violently. When she was five, Eddie expressed excitement over being gifted a pink balloon, but her mother disciplined her in return. Eddie was shoved out of her mother’s room, causing her balloon to pop. Ever since this incident, she has associated pink balloons with her mother’s cruelty. However, Eddie’s foster father, Joel, subverts this association by presenting Eddie with pink balloons representing her various foster parents and siblings; she releases them to symbolize her release from the foster system. Joel then uses a single pink balloon with the word “Dad” to acknowledge her trauma and voice his desire to continue being her father.
Poetry
Poetry is a recurring motif that expresses characters’ truths. Will, who initially abstains from speaking of his late parents, reveals their fate in a poem: “Instead they were met head-on by death, / disguised as an 18-wheeler / behind a cloud of fog” (52). Likewise, Eddie uses poetry to recount and release painful memories of her mother. Lake expresses her anger with Will’s inconsistency in her own poem: “inhumane, monstrous, / merciless, inexorable. / And my personal favorite—asshole” (130). Despite their mutual frustration, Will and Lake also use poetry to express their mutual love. Overall, poetry allows characters to express difficult emotions and topics.
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By Colleen Hoover
