 Themes are the main ideas within a story.  The message the author wants to send you.  Wants you to think about.  Sometimes themes create more questions, but they are designed to expand your thinking.

 Someone has ceased to support you or to look after you.  People feel abandoned in many situations.  Examples – someone stopped being your friend, or more seriously, being left by a husband, mother or sibling, etc.

 - Connor  - Risa  - Lev  - Roland

 In a similar way, the characters in the text are all very much alone regardless of whether they have been abandoned or not.  Being alone is not necessarily always a bad thing. Why?...  What negative effects can being alone for too long have?

 Connor – Chapter One.  Risa – Chapter Two.  Lev - Chapter Three.

 At some time in our life we all struggle with religion.  Do we follow our parents’ footsteps?  Religion might provide comfort during stress.  It might provide answers to life’s deeper mysteries.

 To non-religious people, religious customs can seem strange or even pointless.  Example-- Lev’s friends struggle to understand why he finds pride in being a tithe.

 In the text, Lev particularly struggles to find answers about his religious beliefs. He goes from one religious extreme to another.

 Organ donation is an issue that has many ethical implications.  There are complicated emotional repercussions to organ donations as well as ethical.

 This novel presents a world where this issue is at the extreme end of the spectrum.  Organ donation has become a way of ridding parents of troublesome teens, as well as ensuring a supply of organs are available for sick or disabled non- unwinds.

 Power is something intangible yet it is pervasive in our lives.  There are many ways people can be powerful.  Think about who is powerful in this novel?

 Roland  Risa  The Admiral  The Juvey Cop  Connor  Lev  Stories  Parents

 We all wear masks to help us deal with the many conflicting parts of our lives.  For example, you are not the same with friends as you are with your parents.

 You don’t behave the same way in your job as you do when slouching around in front of the TV.  In this novel, the way someone appears can be very different from how he/she actually is as a person.

 Connor: big and strong but learning to think before acting  Risa: small and weak but very strong emotionally  Pastor Dan: religious leader but internally in disagreement with Lev being unwound  Connor’s parents: pretending that life was still normal after signing the Unwind Order  The Admiral: appearing to be all-powerful and dangerous but actually trying to right a wrong and a very sickly man.  Roland: appearing strong and tough but actually petrified of being Unwound  Lev: small, defenseless, graceful, weak but actually willing to sacrifice himself for a “greater” cause 