3. Group I---lpinard25

In the last part of my book Carlos has fully fallen in love with Emma, his boss's daughter, he also starts to see less hallucinations of his brother. While Carlos nears his final days of training as a chef he hears heartbreaking news that his dad had a heart attack, and was in a hospital in Mexico. Carlos knows he has to leave San Juan and head back to see his father. He quickly says goodbye to everyone and gets on a ferry back to the mainland to catch a flight. When he arrives in Mexico and goes to the hospital his family greets him with open arms. After a few days at the hospital they have a discussion and Carlos expresses his displeasure with his parents and talks about how he feels they have controlled his entire life and says he wants to pursue being a Chef, his parents allow him to follow this path but are still uneasy about him not going to college. Finally Carlos goes home hoping to have received a text back from Emma, but to his displeasure he has not. He gets some rest and finally gets a text back, and ends by saying the only thing in the world he cares about is her. In my novel Carlos feels completely disconnected from his family after his brother's death, as a result he runs away and goes to America to pursue a life that he wants for himself, not what his parents want from him. “When I get home I'm leaving. I don't know where I'm going but I'm leaving. Mom and dad are probably on their way home too, but they'll have to make a few explanations, give some instructions to the caterers or whatever. I have some time but as soon as I pull the suitcase from the top shelf in my closet, toss it onto my bed” (Alsaid 24). This quote shows that Carlos was disconnected with the way his parents handled his older brother's death, which caused him to leave the house and move out of the country to live the way he wanted to, not how his parents wanted him to.

The book North and Happy is a book written by Adi Alsaid who discusses the life of Carlos Portillo. Carlos suffers a great loss when his brother dies after he was shot in Mexico. Carlos lives a very sheltered life, and attends a high class school. He is also a dual citizen, he is a citizen of Mexico, and the United States. In this section of the book North and Happy, Carlos settles down in the Washington San Juan islands. After his journey to a few restaurants he settles on the one his deceased brother likes the most, he then gets a job at that restaurant as a dishwasher. And begins training to be a chef, he then sparks a relationship with the chef’s daughter. In this section he also really starts to grieve over his brother's loss. He grieves by hallucinating core memories with his brother, but also starts to process the trauma of the incident. In the last part of my book Carlos has fully fallen in love with Emma, his boss's daughter, he also starts to see less hallucinations of his brother. While Carlos nears his final days of training as a chef he hears heartbreaking news that his dad had a heart attack, and was in a hospital in Mexico. Carlos knows he has to leave San Juan and head back to see his father. He quickly says goodbye to everyone and gets on a ferry back to the mainland to catch a flight. When he arrives in Mexico and goes to the hospital his family greets him with open arms. After a few days at the hospital they have a discussion and Carlos expresses his displeasure with his parents and talks about how he feels they have controlled his entire life and says he wants to pursue being a Chef, his parents allow him to follow this path but are still uneasy about him not going to college. Finally Carlos goes home hoping to have received a text back from Emma, but to his displeasure he has not. He gets some rest and finally gets a text back, and ends by saying the only thing in the world he cares about is her.  In my novel Carlos feels completely disconnected from his family after his brother's death, as a result he runs away and goes to America to pursue a life that he wants for himself, not what his parents want from him. “When I get home I'm leaving. I don't know where I'm going but I'm leaving. Mom and dad are probably on their way home too, but they'll have to make a few explanations, give some instructions to the caterers or whatever. I have some time but as soon as I pull the suitcase from the top shelf in my closet, toss it onto my bed” (Alsaid 24). This quote shows that Carlos was disconnected with the way his parents handled his older brother's death, which caused him to leave the house and move out of the country to live the way he wanted to, not how his parents wanted him to.

It sounds like your character is going threw a lot, Did your character have a good/healthy relationship with his parents before his brother's death?

In my book 'Strike Zone' by Mike Lupica Nick has a close 2 friends on the team that he's neighbors with who are Ben and Diego. But when Nick notices a mysterious man lurking on his street corner, he senses a threat. Suddenly, his worst fears are realized, and just when it seems there's no one they can trust, an unexpected hero emerges and changes everything. This hero is Michael Arroyo Yankees pitcher who faced the same problems that Nick did as a kid. Michael moved from Mexico at 14 years old due to violance in his community. Nick doesn't have kids on his team that give him issues. However his talent gets in the way of others and parents of athletes on the team aren't happy because they lose their spot because of Nick. "If you get more spin on you're curve ball it will be way more dangerous." said Ben (Lupica 159) This quote represents Nick taking his friends feedback to heart which they debate on for weeks until Ben makes the game tying run in the Summer championship game. Nick for then moved on from it because he realized Ben was just trying to make him a better player and a better aspect to the team.

fstlaurent25 thanks for the reply, in my book my character Norris, is also an Athlete and when he lived in Canada he played hockey,  it was a big piece of his identity. Is baseball a big part of your character's identity?