The False Moon

The short story “The False Moon” By shirlie Golden, is about how a boy lives with his alcoholic mother. The theme in the text is misleading. His mother doesn’t take care of her son and she always chooses her own needs over his. The boy is told from the boy’s point of view. There is also other themes in the story, such as Family, teenager and parenting. One of these thmes could also be the main theme, but that depends on how you interpret the story.

The main character is a “Lanky,skinny” boy with “Large eyes and lashes more suited to a girl” (P 1 Line 14-15) He struggles with math an doesn’t think that you can trust what people say. The fact that he doesn’t trust people tells us a bit about him as a person. Because of that he doesn’t have a lot of people around him and might not talk to a lot of the people that are around him. He is living with huge disappointments, and expresses it through art. Art is also the only thing he is good at in school. He is so passionate about it that he rather would spend his money on paint instead of buying lunch. He also doesn’t care about his own health, his body and maybe not his life at all.

Through one of his works he tells how he feels like a child trapped inside a broken bottle, with a woman looking the other way, watching a shadow of a man. The woman in the picture looks the other way, is his mother Kay and the man is his mother’s boyfriend Dan. The hild in the bottle is himself. The picture shows his feelings about her mother turning her back to him.

When Kay sees the picture she confronts and says that she didn’t know he felt that way. “I know it’s been like crap for you, but no more, no more.” (Page 2, Line 129) Afterwards she give him her word on that It wont be like that anymore. She really means it this time as she says “Really, this time it really is.” The adverb tells us that she probably have promised that she would change before but didn’t. She also promised that she would break up with Dan, but didn’t. She therefore chooses Dan over the main character. Her little interest is also shown when they speak to each other. She prefers to look at herself in the mirror instead of him. Every night he stays awake, waiting for her to come and check on him, waiting for her to ttell him what to do but she didn’t care.