Content Warning: This section discusses bullying, child abuse, and a cave in. 

“I compared our feet. Next to my kids’ size three Family Dollar clearance sneakers, Bo’s heavy motorcycle boots looked like they belonged on the feet of a giant—a mean, ugly giant with blond hair and pork-and-beans-sprinkled-with-chewing-tobacco breath.”

As Gus tussles with Bo, Bowling takes a moment to describe Gus’s shoes as “Family Dollar clearance sneakers.” In addition to physically describing Gus, this characterization makes it clear that Gus, like most people in Nowhere, struggles with economic insecurity. Furthermore, in contrasting Gus’s sneakers with Bo’s “heavy motorcycle boots,” Bowling emphasizes their physical disparity: Gus is small and unassuming, while Bo towers like a “giant.”

“In the short time Rossi had lived in Nowhere, she hadn’t spoken a single word to me. I wasn’t sure she had ever even looked at me until this moment. I knew she would never give up Loretta. Not for a useless wimp like me. And I wouldn’t want her to anyway.”

At this early stage of the novel, Gus and Rossi are essentially strangers. They barely speak, and Gus can’t possibly anticipate Rossi’s deeper sense of justice—assuming, for instance, that she values her bike far more than Gus’s safety. Of course, as the novel continues, Gus and Rossi will grow close, and in comparing the novel’s end to this particular quote, the reader can appreciate just how critically their relationship evolves.

“I knew a lot of vocabulary words. Vocabulary words were just about the most important things in the world to me. And not because I found learning them to be a thrilling adventure. Vocabulary words were going to save my life.”

This quote introduces Gus’s love of vocabulary, which he often sprinkles throughout the text as a narrative enhancement. Gus also suggests that vocabulary—and, by extension, academics—will play a significant role in his quest to leave Nowhere and its limitations behind—a concept also explored in Escaping Oppressive Circumstances. Also, Gus’s facetious reference to a “thrilling adventure” subtly foreshadows the novel’s central plot, when he and his friends undertake a task beyond their wildest imagination.