Holes by Louis Sachar
Fiction
I appreciated Holes for the
same reason I appreciated The Westing Game. Like The Westing Game,
Holes had small details that were part of a bigger picture.
When
shoes fall out of the sky onto Stanley Yelnats, he is accused of stealing them
and sent to Camp Green Lake. Camp Green Lake is an unusual juvenile detention
center. For one thing, there is no lake; in fact, it hasn’t rained for one
hundred years. It also employs an unusual method of building character.
Everyday all the boys on Camp Green Lake dig one hole each. All the holes must
be five feet wide and five feet deep. All
of this is overseen by the Warden, or the president of Camp Green Lake. As
Stanley digs holes day after day, he blames his bad fortune on his
no-good-dirty-rotten-pig-stealing great-great-grandfather. Old family knowledge
says that when Stanley’s great-great grandfather was young he made a deal with a
mysterious woman named Madame Zeroni and failed to hold up the bargain. As
revenge, Madame Zeroni cursed all of his descendants including Stanley. At Camp
Green Lake, Stanley meets an inmate who goes by the nickname Zero and has a reputation
for loving to dig holes. As days pass
Stanley and Zero become close friends. Eventually,
Stanley begins to question all the digging at camp and soon realizes that it
isn’t just a character building technique-- the Warden is looking for
something.
Zero’s name plays an important role in Holes.
A zero is a circle. A circle commonly stands for eternity or something that is
endless, in this case it is the Yelnats family debt to Madame Zeroni. When
Stanley performs an act that repays his great-great grandfather’s debt, Zero’s real
name is revealed, therefore breaking the circle of debt.
