This is a weird book. I feel like this is a good way to describe “There There” by Tommy Orange. As we go along with the characters through each chapter, we get put in a different environment.
“There There” by Tommy Orange might leave a reader feeling uneasy. In the chapter “Blue” in the book “There There” you can feel the emotion feelings in Blue’s body as she was trying to get to a safe space. An example of this is between lines 247-253 in part III of the book.
“What, what the fuck do you want? We just got in a wreck,” I say.
Where you at?” he says.
“I can’t talk. I’m calling an ambulance,” I say.
“What are you doing in OKC?” he says, and my stomach drops. Geraldine looks at me and mouths: Hang up.
“I don’t know how you know that, but I’m hanging up now,” I say.
“I’m almost there,” Paul says.”
The part of the book is about a protagonist who finally gets the courage and bravery to leave a toxic abusive relationship she has found herself in. As she is almost to the Greyhound station she gets found by her abusive husband. The problem driving the plot is person vs. person? What I mean is that Blue is fighting for her life in this situation and all she wants to do is have a peaceful good life.
The issues that keep coming up are Blue’s husband is finding ways to get closer to finding her exact location. You can see this on lines 254 – 260 where it says:
“I hang up. “Did you fucking tell him where we are?”
“No, I did not fucking tell him where we are,” Geraldine says, and wipes her nose with her shirt.
“Then how the fuck does he know we’re here?” I say more to myself than to her.
“Shit.”
“What?
“Hector must have texted him. Hector’s all fucked up right now. I gotta go after him.”
“What about your car? Are you okay?”
“I’ll be fine. Get to the bus station. Hide in the bathroom until the bus is ready to leave.”
The theme here is the will to survive. I mean, Blue’s actual life is what is at stake and maybe even the life of her friend who helped her get away.
