The Lord of the Flies and Other Stories are a collection of short stories dealing with many issues that are encountered by today’s youth. There are several themes interwoven with these seven short stories such as curiosity, relationship, abandonment, homelessness, and social tensions.
Although the themes are serious, humor is interwoven within all the stories. The reader will find the characters very engaging and thought-provoking. The reading is also fast paced and smooth. In addition to great reading, this collection of short stories offers six interesting insights.
Insight One: All the stories are from the point of view of young adult characters. For example, in the first short story The Lord of the Flies; the main characters are two girls attempting to understand a mysterious short order cook who minded his own business.
Another story called Bermuda is about a young boy whose father vanished while they were at sea. Other stories such as Fallen Angel and Pinhole Camera are from the point of view of young people.
Insight Two: Most of the short stories are about young people facing and resolving problems without the help of parents. They interact with other adults and make decisions, several of which are humorous, such as when teenage girls outwit a flirtatious teacher.
Insight Three: The reading is humorous and fast-paced, yet very interesting and engaging to young people and adults alike.
Insight Four: There are a number of short stories crossing many genres. There is a mystery, humor, an adventure, and drama in these short stories, with humor interwoven in all of them.
Insight Five: The one story that zooms in upon ethnic and cultural difference is the short story, Chinese Baby. This story is about a Canadian Anglophone family who must put its nationalist attitude aside in order to deliver Francophone families and Chinese babies from a harsh winter storm. The racial and social tensions are resolved at the end of the story.
The remainder of the stories is of such that all teenage readers can identify with the characters. The issues that are dealt with within these stories are the issues that many young people experience in their lives, whether white American, African-American, Chinese, Hispanic etc.
Insight Six: All the characters within the stories end up choosing positive paths in life. Although some stories are serious in the beginning, in the end, the humor uplifts the situations and the issues are resolved. The characters are optimistic about their decisions.
Insight Seven: The author Tim Wynne-Jones is an expert in getting inside the minds of young people and revealing the emotions they feel.
The characters in the stories experience emotions such as fear, sadness, anger, hatred, forgiveness, respect, satisfaction, and optimism.
These emotions are important in the life of all young people. In reading these stories the adolescent will be able to relate his or her own emotions to those of the characters. Lord of the Flies and Other Stories should be a fantastic read to both young people and adults alike.
