Emily+M

= "That was Then, This is now" =

By: S.E Hinton
Question 1) Who are Bryon and Mark?  Answer 1) Bryon and Mark,the main characters of the story,are best friends that live together in Bryon's house because Mark's parents died in a drunk gun battle. Bryon has dark hair and a muscular body. Mark has golden hair and a smaller body than Bryon; however is stronger then he looks. Question 2) Who are the two young people Bryon meets at the hospital?  Answer 2) The two young people Bryon meets at the hospital is Mike Chambers, the wounded boy in the room across the hall, and Cathy, M&M's older sister. Question 3) What kind of relationship does Bryon have with Charlie?  Answer 3) Bryon and Charlie have been friends since Bryon was __#|dating__ Charlie's sister. Even though they broke up, Charlie and Bryon remain friends however; if Bryon or Mark forget to pay Charlie at the bar, Charlie will do what it takes to get the money. Question 4) What happens at the dance?  Answer 4) At the dance a fight breaks out in the parking lot. Angela hired a guy to attack Curtis and he did. Just before the guy was about to hit Curtis on the head with a bottle, Mark cuts in and explains they should fight fair. Right after the man hit Mark on the side of the head with the bottle and knocked Mark out. The cops showed up just after and then Bryon went to the hospital with Mark so he could get stitches. Question 5) What does Bryon begin to discover in his private conversations with with Mark?  Answer 5) Bryon begins to discover that Mark feels that a lot of things are changing, like the people they hang out with. Mark also thinks something is ending so something else can begin. This makes Bryon realize that Mark isn't growing up. Question 6) What happened to Charlie? How do Bryon and Mark feel about it?  Answer 6) Charlie was shot in an alley outside the bar by some people from Texas that Mark and Bryon tried to hustle. Bryon felt very guilty and it really shook him up, but Mark felt different. It wasn't their faults and he tried to explain that to Bryon, but that didn't __#|work__. Question 7) What do Mark and Cathy think of each other?  Answer 7) Mark and Cathy aren't really friends because Mark is jealous of all the time Cathy spends with Bryon, and Cathy thinks Mark is a bad influence of Bryon. Question 8) What does Mark do to Angel? Why?  Answer 8) Mark cut off Angel's hair because he was getting even for when they guy she hired knocked him out. Question 9) In chapter seven, what does Bryon begin to discover about his good friend Mark?  Answer 9) Bryon begins to discover the truths behind Mark going to live with Bryon. Bryon is also discovering that he and Mark are becoming more distant than the first talk they had. Question 10) What happens to Bryon at Terry Jones' house? How does his attitude change?  Answer 10) At Terry Jones' house Bryon got beat up by Angela's brothers because of cutting her hair off. After this happened his attitude changed from wanting to always get even to not wanting to get even at all. He didn't want anyone to fight the Shepard's or get even for what they did, he just wanted to move past fighting. Question 11) In chapter nine, what happens to M&M? How does this move Bryon?  Answer 11) M&M took a drug LSD at the house he was staying at when he ran away. The drug gave him strange visions of spiders eating his stomach, holding him down and things like that. This moved Bryon because now he felt like M&M was his little brother too. He was so scared about what was going on with M&M that he helped him realize how much he cares about M&M. Question 12) What shocking discovery does Bryon make in Mark's bedroom? What does he do?  Answer 12) Bryon discovers a lot of pills in a cylinder under Mark's mattress. When he finally pieced together that Mark was selling them and that was how he was making all that money, he called the cops. Mark came home only to find out that Bryon called the cops and they were going to put him in jail and that was exactly what the cops did. Question 13) How does Bryon's relationship with his friends and his attitude towards life completely change?  Answer 13) Bryon and Cathy broke up after he turned Mark in. Cathy started dating Curtis, whom Bryon stopped hating. He visited Mark once and realized they weren't friends anymore. He saw M&M at a store and they caught up for a few minutes before leaving. When he was working he saw Angela and she had nothing really nice to say to Bryon. All of Bryon's friendships and relationships failed, he really only had his mom. This affected his attitude towards life in a negative way. He didn't care anymore about anything. Question 14) How does Bryon feel at the end of the book?  Answer 14) At the end Bryon feels empty. After all of that stuff happening with M&M, Cathy, and Mark he kept questioning himself and the decisions he made in that year. He wondered how things would have been different with his friends if he did or didn't do certain things. Question 15) What do you think about this book and what life message does it teach you?  Answer 15) This book was very surprising and different from other books i have read. I enjoyed though a lot, I loved how it was about the maturing of the main character and how he realizes violence isn't the answer. It was also sad because in most books it sums up with a happy ending for the main characters, but in this book the main characters aren't even friends at the end. This book taught me about friendship and about making decisions in life. At one point everything may be easy and in the next moment everything is complicated. It also taught me that getting even won't get me anywhere. It's a giant circle and if you keep trying to get revenge the cycle will never stop and nothing gets solved. This book had a lot of meaning and made me really think. It was a great read and i would definitely recommend this book to anyone.