Alabama Moon

Consider Moon’s character attributes. In what ways do his traits and reactions reflect an average 10-year-old boy’s? Besides his refined survival skills like marksmanship, hunting, and trapping, what traits and reactions does Moon display that are unlike most boys his age? Reference specific scenes in your answer.

The novel is linear except for lengthy backstory retelling the last year of Pap’s life, which includes the discovery the hunting lodge and Pap’s accident. What impressions do you form about Pap, such as his character traits, from that backstory retelling? Do these impressions shift as Moon discovers more about Pap on his journey (such as information from Mr. Abroscotto and Uncle Mike), or are your initial impressions supported by what Moon eventually learns? Use details to support your response.

Though Moon’s spoken words are spare on details, his interior monologue offers sensory imagery and figurative language that help the reader envision his surroundings. Find and discuss two to three passages like this in the novel. What is Moon’s tone toward his subject in each passage? What language and connotation choices contribute to that tone?

Moon says more than once in the novel that Mr. Abroscotto is not his friend. Considering that Mr. Abroscotto seems to be trying to help Moon consistently, what qualities can you infer that Moon upholds in his definition of friendship? Use details and quotations from the scenes between Moon and Mr. Abroscotto to support your answer.

Constable Sanders serves as a notable shadow archetype to Moon; he is cruel, bitter, unsympathetic, and vengeful. What other characters or entities serve as antagonistic forces in the story? Consider two or three additional conflicts that parallel or juxtapose against Moon’s ongoing conflict with Sanders. Explain your ideas with references to the text.

Judge Mackin speaks of charity and goodwill when he says, late in the story, “Why can’t you just put the kid on your sofa and help him out a little? Hell, put him on your floor. This kid would been fine in somebody’s barn” (264). In what other ways does the theme topic of charity show in the novel? What does the outcome of Moon’s figurative quest to find a home free of trouble and loneliness suggest about charity?

Moon possesses few material items, and over the course of his misadventures loses everything by the time he goes home with Hal; in fact, when Mr. Mitchell asks if he needs a place for his things, Moon says, “Nossir. I don’t have any things” (179). When in the narrative does Moon show regard or care for his possessions? Which of his possessions stand as the strongest symbols of his upbringing? his will and stubbornness? his new-learned empathy?

Hal is a dynamic secondary character with a strong character arc as he changes in major ways from the beginning to the end of the book in his ideas, his manner, his actions, and/or his beliefs. Recall and comment on Hal’s first actions in the story and juxtapose these against his last actions in the story. What lessons can you infer that Hal learns because of knowing Moon? Support your thoughts with details from scenes in which Hal appears.