79 pages • 2 hours read
Susin NielsenWe Are All Made of Molecules
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2015A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Themes
Exclusionary Social Hierarchy
We Are Made of Molecules examines how exclusionary social hierarchies damage relationships and prevent people from connecting across their differences. Social hierarchy and status are important at Borden Secondary School. Everyone implicitly knows who matters and who doesn’t. Pretty fashionistas like Ashley and star athletes like Jared control the top tier. The key requirement is to look good. A good heart is immaterial because image is everything. Ashley explains:
See, I’m pretty much at the top of the Social Ladder in my grade […] People like Stewart don’t even count. They don’t even have a foot on the ladder. They can’t even touch the ladder. They are forbidden to go anywhere near the ladder. (73)
Those with status are eager to keep the less popular out. Superior social status can only be maintained by identifying and excluding so-called inferior students. Ashley is unkind to Stewart in part because she needs to maintain her preeminence. Jared uses a similar tactic to reinforce his superiority by bullying Stewart. Feeling special can only be sustained by excluding and demeaning others.
Wielding the weapon of exclusion proves to be a double-edged sword. Ashley admits: “I can never appear weak or vulnerable, or people like Lauren will go in for the kill” (74). As much as she enjoys her superior position, Ashley is acutely aware of how precarious it is. Gossip could damage her reputation, which is one of the reasons she is so careful to hide the fact that her father is gay, even though this is a betrayal of her family and her values.
Despite Ashley’s best efforts, negative gossip topples her from the throne. When everyone at school learns about Ashley’s gay father and the pictures Jared took at her New Year’s Eve party, they treat her like a social pariah. As she predicted, a show of weakness and vulnerability leads to her downfall. Jared experiences similar humiliation when Stewart pulls down his shorts during a basketball game. Those on the top rung of the ladder must maintain a perfect façade in front of their classmates. If they can’t, they will be excluded, just like the Stewarts of the high school world. Through the unhappiness caused by attempting to maintain her position in an exclusionary social hierarchy, Nielsen critiques social systems that rely on the humiliation and degradation of others
Inclusive Molecules
If Ashely embodies the principle of exclusion, Stewart embodies inclusion. He insists that all life is made of molecules, which are interconnected. As a self-proclaimed nerd, Stewart uses a science metaphor to make an existential point. If everyone is made of molecules, then everyone is equal. Molecules are democratic, while the social ladder is aristocratic. The antagonism between these two very different ways of viewing people is embodied by Ashely’s antagonism toward Stewart.
Fortunately, Stewart’s egalitarian ideals generally prevent him from retaliating against Ashley. He even tries to explain the notion of democratic molecules to her:
‘Right now, as I’m talking to you, you’re probably picking up a few Stewart molecules and vice versa […] I think it’s kind of beautiful. Everything, and everyone, is interconnected.’ Schrödinger wandered up to me and started rubbing against my legs. I picked him up and held him close to me. ‘Right now I’m breathing in cat molecules’ (120).
Stewart cherishes his mother’s afghan because it still contains subatomic pieces of her. Bit by bit, the reader sees Ashley succumb to the molecule theory, too. Initially, she can only extend it to someone she regards as her social equal—Jared. Ashely takes his warm-up jacket home and sleeps with it: “I guess it means I was breathing in a few of Jared’s molecules. Which is super-creepy and super-romantic all at the same time” (143).
Ashley’s transformation is illustrated by her willingness to extend the molecule metaphor to others. But it isn’t until the final chapters that she acknowledges the less-popular students at the school as people worthy of respect. The outcasts come to her and commiserate over her rejection by the in-crowd. They know how it feels to be excluded, but unlike the popular kids, they are willing to extend acceptance to people who are different from themselves. Now, Ashley knows how bad it feels too, and she’s ready to embrace the concept of equality. Her change of heart is demonstrated by the new t-shirts she designs for the protection squads, which read “WE ARE ALL MADE OF MOLECULES” (245).
The Shape of a Family
Just as Stewart uses a scientific metaphor to explain the interconnectedness of life, he uses an analogy from geometry to express his concept of what a family should look like: “I have always wanted a sister. A brother, not so much. I like symmetry, and I always felt that a sister would create the perfect quadrangle or ‘family square,’ with the X chromosomes forming two sides and the Ys forming the rest” (1). Stewart’s hope for a family square are shattered when his mother dies. He expresses that loss in geometric terms as well: “We had been like an equilateral triangle. Mom was the base that held up the whole structure. When we lost her, the other two sides just collapsed in on each other” (2).
Stewart’s yearning for geometric wholeness will come to dominate the novel. He can no longer use these shapes to describe his family when he and his father move in with the Andersons. Rather than a family, Stewart finds himself on one side of an antagonistic seesaw. Stewart and his father take a relaxed view of home. They fail to pick up after themselves and leave dirty dishes in the sink. Their greatest offense is to hang a large painting of the deceased Mrs. Inkster breastfeeding Stewart. Both Caroline and Ashley take a dim view of Inkster incursions into their stylish and neat home. Adjustment and accommodation are required from all parties. Leonard and Stewart need to learn how to clean up after themselves. Caroline needs to allow them to introduce some items from their old house into the new one. For her part, Ashley needs to accept her father’s boyfriend and sexuality.
The Inksters and Caroline accept Phil and Michael. Gradually, Ashley follows suit. The holidays bring everyone together and begin the process of forging new connections. After he defends her reputation, Ashley forms an attachment to Stewart. The two teens then bring one more member into the family circle by retrieving the lost Schrödinger.
By the end of the novel, Stewart redefines the nature of family to include far more members than the nuclear group he had envisioned. He says: “Now I think of my new family not as a quadrangle, but as an octagon. I have concluded that Mom belongs there along with everyone else, because her memory—and her molecules—live on” (240-41).
Stewart labels his octagon with the names of everyone he now considers family: Mom, Dad, Caroline, Ashley, Stewart, Phil, Michael, and Schrödinger. Most of them aren’t linked by blood but by affection and the particles that bind them all to one another and to life itself. For Stewart, this is now what a family looks like.
