Analysis Of Ashes By Susan Beth Pfeffer

The realistic fiction story, “Ashes”, by Susan Beth Pfeffer is about a young girl who has two very polar opposite parents. A fun, but irresponsible father, and a practical, proactive mother. Ashes faces a major dilemma when her financially troubled father asks Ashes to steal from her mother’s emergency fund for his own personal needs. Sometimes, the people you love most can be selfish and deceive you. This relates to my story because Ashes’ dad is manipulative, deceptive, and selfish.

All children have a unique and personal bond with their parents. Whether or not a parent is always present in child’s life, they always manage to have some type of impact on their child’s life. Loung Ung’s father had an extremely profound impact on her life as well as the rest of her family. Without even reading her memoir, First They Killed My Father, you can discern from the title that Loung Ung’s father played a crucial role in her upbringing. Sadly you can also gather from the title that Loung’s father is dead which implies that Loung did not have an exceptionally happy childhood.

By the time Ashleigh was born, her parent’s marriage was dying. Ashes is a fictional story written by Susan Beth Pfeffer. Ashes is about a young girl named Ashleigh who is commonly called Ashes. The reader infers she is around the age of 10-14 years. Her parents are divorced and Ashleigh’s dad wants her to steal money from her mom, he wanted he to steal 200 dollars. Ashleigh did not steal the money because her dad is not trustworthy, Ashleigh’s mom is a responsible adult, and Ashleigh understands that her dad is a bad influence.

Making countless mistakes is part of being a parent, there is no definition for a perfect one. The characteristics of a “good” parent do emerge throughout literature and in the world around us. “The Secret to Not Getting Stuck” by Jay Woodruff is a short story in which a teenager deals with his dysfunctional drunk of a father all the while pursuing his own passions in life. Through his struggle with his father’s demise, his mother embodies what it is to be a good parent. She continues to be strong and resilient for her grieving son while letting him pursue his passions.

In preparation for this paper I chose to read Fire in the ashes: twenty five years among the poorest children in America by Jonathan Kozol. In this book Kozol has followed these children and their family’s lives for the past twenty five years. In his writing Kozol portrays a point of view most from his background and standing would not be capable of having. He portrays what life is like for those who have been let down by the system that was meant to protect them. Kozols writing style can be very blunt at times, not for shock value, but for the sake of portraying these children’s realities, and not sugarcoating the inequalities that they are faced with. There was a lot of balance within this book. In the book there are two parts: part one

Best of the Worst Parenting is never perfect. Every parents questions whether they are raising their child correctly, and no parent ever feels like they are doing the right thing. With no clear distinction between good and bad parenting, it is usually left to personal preferences and judgements to decide which parents have adequately raised their children and which have failed. When a parent so call “fails,” often it is the children with their strong will and determination to survive that collectively raise themselves. In Jesmyn Ward’s Sing, Unburied, Sing, Leonie, one of the narrators and the mother of another narrator, Jojo, is not the most caring, hands-on mother, but is loving of her children nevertheless.

From the time humans are born to today their parents have a great impact on the way they act and think. They teach

Everyone knows the aphorism “Mama knows best,” but even a parent can be misguided. A parent’s behavior notably influences their children. In the short story “The Lie” by Kurt Vonnegut, the author scrutinizes the behavior of parents. A parents’ mission is to give their children opportunities to progress and develop, to show them that they need to amend mistakes, and to place them on the righteous path.

Almost everyone, if not everyone, has been in a sticky situation like Ashleigh’s in nearing the end of “Ashes,” by Susan Beth Pfeffer. Ashleigh’s parents got divorced, when she was still young, because her dad is a very childish man. Her dad owes two hundred dollars, because he lost a bet to some people. Ashleigh’s father and mother used to live together, and the father knows about a teapot that hold a couple hundred dollars at Ashleigh’s mom’s apartment. Ashleigh will take the money from the teapot and give it to her dad, because she doesn’t want to let him down, her father makes her feels sorry for him, and her father makes promises to her.

Ashleigh’s Betrayal Ashleigh is faced with a mind-numbing decision. In the short story Ashes, by Susan Beth Pfeffer, Ashleigh is a young girl with divorced parents. When her dad asks her to take money from her mom to get him out of debt, Ashleigh has to choose. She can either betray her mother and steal her emergency money or leave her father in a desperate situation. The story ends before this conflict can be resolved, yet the unrevealed ending is clear.

“A generation ago, an American child could reasonably expect to grow up with his or her father (1). The culture of fatherhood in American has drastically changed since the 1950’s, with a decline of fathers involved in their children’s lives. This journal article questions the role of fatherhood, but also highlights the importance of fatherhood. It raises these questions: Is the role of a father beneficial for the child? Does a father’s physical or emotional absence have harmful effects, or no effect, on the development of the

In doing so there may be a chance to limit the amount of failure in that community. If fathers are significant in how prosperous their sons become, then fathers may need to be educated on the importance of fatherhood. In cases where “Self-determination” has driven individuals to succeed, they may be able to mentor future generations on how to project that from within. Davis, Jenkins and Hunt (2007) tell of their stories of how having a fatherless childhood effect their development, but it also tells of how they overcame their life obstacles. These three doctors were reared in homes where they experienced and saw a lot of things that lead them down the wrong path.

Ashes says he helps society because he says whenever he’s late, “I saw a women on the street so I changed her tire for her” or she said he found a lost wallet, returned it, and turned down a reward (Pfeffer 1). The last reason Ashes wants to repay her father was for his love. Already explained in the first paragraph Ashes likes her father more than her mother so she wants to repay him for

Hello Yilun, I enjoyed your post. To talk more about the remains in the ashes after cremation, I found a website that talks more about this. In the website, it mentions that the cremation process destroys all traces of organic, carbon-based matter and all bodily fluids escape through the cremator's exhaust. As you mentioned, human ashes do not present any health hazard to the environment. After cremation, the only thing remaining of the body is part of the skeletal structure and some small amounts of salts and minerals.

The mother provided the mental and emotional, which are immensely important for the child’s mental and emotional growth and considered the heart of the family. The father, on the other hand, is the head and the strong man of the family. Parents have the basic responsibility of keeping the family intact. In a perfect world, all children lived in happy homes with two loving, doting parents who are comfortable both financially and emotionally.