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AntoniaAC's picture

Paradise for sale!

Guavas. Macadamia nuts. Mangoes. Made their three thousand acres of Russet Burbanks seem downright dull. She sighed. Cass could not imagine paradise." (31)

Farmwork is extremely hard work. And even with developments in technology it still remains laborious and difficult. For Cass, I think much of the beauty of the eviroment has been drained out of her way of thinking and she no longer see it. The enviroment play a large role in her life but her idenitity no longer connects with it.

"because by the following fall, when potato prices plummeted to $4.00, Lloyd made more money on the lease than he would have had he planted the land. Carl Unger, on the other hand went bankrupt. He was forced to go to work of Lloyd and the following years were bad ones for Cassie." (58)

This shows the interconnected responses people have to the earth. On one hand the profit and the other the loss. For Carl, he was on the latter end and so hit his kids and made life miserable. The world works in funny ways and some people just better off than other in the way of "luck." For Cass, her life was shaped by how the crops did, whether or not her father would come home angry from work. This duel relationship created her identity and had a large impact on her brain development and how she thinks.

"We don't," he said. "But they say it's safer than pesticides." Hewas trying to reassure but his voice revealed the doubt that have been eating at him, like root rot, starting with the war and growing deeper with each disaster." (98)

Poor Will. He's trying his best but I think that his efforts to find solutions are misguided. Its not solution to pollution.The subject being refered to are genetically modified plants (GMOs) that have been manipulated into repelling/killing off beetles. This seems good but as time has show GMOs have been equally as destructive as pesticides . The relationship between Will's insecurities and the enviroment is that his decisions are impacting the world.