SuitabookPurple Heart
Patricia McCormick
- Reading
- Read in manageable stretches and pause after combat scenes. A brief check-in about how Matt’s uncertainty is affecting you can help decide whether to continue or take a break.
- Themes
- Responsibility in combat: Matt cannot fully recall how he was involved when a young Iraqi boy was shot, and he struggles with whether he is a hero or guilty. Matt’s incomplete memory and the complicated circumstances of combat make responsibility difficult to assign.
- Memory and injury: Matt’s traumatic brain injury leaves him struggling to recall what happened and how it relates to the boy. The injury is presented as part of why Matt’s recollection is incomplete, shaping how the story reveals events.
- Worth knowing
- Expect wartime danger and death, including the shooting of a child, alongside a soldier’s traumatic brain injury and fear about acting under fire.