A Book Analysis on What Things Mean by Sophia N.

Lee

I. SETTING
The place and time of the novel isn’t clearly described by Sophia Lee,
the author. Although the place where Olive and her family lives, in a village
just like most subdivisions in the Commonwealth District, Manila, was
mentioned in the novel. Sophia Lee had set up a backdrop setting in this
novel. The setting in this novel isn’t really significant to the plot. The setting
isn’t also described in detail and is not well – developed. The novel is
character – driven and it only needed the setting for the events to take place
somewhere so that it can be more understandable for the readers but the
novel really focuses on the character’s feelings, thoughts, and relationship to
others.

ASPECTS OF A SETTING

 Immediate Social Group

Olive is surrounded and is also living with her family, her Mom
together with her extended family.

Alba (Olive's
Louanna Mom)
(Olive's
Cousin; Lola Araceli
daughter of
Auntie Pat)

Uncle Ricky Olive's Immediate Auntie Jo

(Auntie Pat's (Elder Sister
Husband) Social Group of Alba)

Auntie Pat Uncle Sol

(Younger (Auntie Jo's
Sister of Alba) Stella (Olive's Husband)
Cousin;
daughter of
Auntie Jo)
 Wider Social Setting
Olive’s family, the Guerrero family is a typical Filipino family
living together in Commonwealth District in Manila. It was mentioned
in the novel that Olive’s family lives in a village called Il Paradiso that
is described as a gated compound with round – the – clock security.
Within their village lie several houses, one that is a Spanish style villa
designed by her Mom and an architect at the same time, an English
style cottage, a modern – looking house with huge glass windows, etc.
Also, there was one event in the novel called the fruit crate days every
first of the month where huge crates with fruits are delivered to their
family from abroad. With all of these, we can infer that the Guerrero
family is a financially stable family and that they come with a high
social standing in the community.

 Geography
The place where the story happened is in the village where Olive
and her family live in Commonwealth District, Manila. Since it is just a
backdrop setting, the geography of the setting didn’t affect the
character’s actions, the kind of activities the characters had, and the
plot.

 Historical Period
On the year that the novel was published, nothing really significant
happened that connects to the story. What Things Mean is published
by Scholastic Singapore and is also launched last 2016. The story
happened in a modern time. Sophia N. Lee wrote the novel for a final
project for a writing class that she was taking at University of the
Philippines Diliman Creative Writing MA program. According to Lee,
the class was an elective called Writing for Young Adults under
Professor Heidi Eusebio - Abad. It was also Prof. Abad who
introduced Lee to SABA and encouraged her to send her manuscript
as an entry. What Things Mean won the Scholastic Asian Book Award
on 2014.
II. CHARACTERS

Olive
Louanna
(Olive's Cousin; Alba (Olive's
daughter of Mom)
Auntie Pat)

Uncle Ricky
(Auntie Pat's Lola Araceli
Husband) Character Map of What
Things Mean

Auntie Pat
Auntie Jo (Elder
(Younger Sister
Sister of Alba)
of Alba)
Stella (Olive's
Uncle Sol
Cousin;
(Auntie Jo's
daughter of
Husband)
Auntie Jo)

a. Olive
Olive is the main character in the story. She is a fourteen – year – old girl
struggling with her differences from her family and finding out the truth about
someone nobody talks about, her father.

b. Alba
Alba is a flat character. She is the mother of Olive. She refuses to talk about
Olive’s father every single time Olive’s trying to ask things. She thinks that in her
life and Olive’s, he’s already no one important.

c. Lola Araceli
Lola Araceli is a flat character. She is the grandmother of Olive. She was
the one who put the box with cans of refried beans in it in Olive’s room which
became a big lead to Olive finding the truth about her father.
d. Auntie Jo
Auntie Jo is a flat character. She is the elder sister of Alba and the mother
of Stella.

e. Uncle Sol
Uncle Sol is a flat character. He is the husband of Auntie Jo, the father of
Stella, and a person whom Olive considers as one of the persons she best gets
along with. He was also the one sending the fruit crates every first of the month.

f. Stella
Stella is a flat character. She is Olive’s cousin, daughter of Auntie Jo and
Uncle Sol. She’s the one whom Olive observes, hangs out with, and talks to.

g. Auntie Pat
Auntie Pat is a flat character. She is the younger sister or Alba and the
mother of Louanna.

h. Uncle Ricky
Uncle Ricky is a flat character. He is the husband of Auntie Pat and the
father of Louanna. He is also a person Olive considers as one of the persons she
best gets along with at home. He performs card tricks on Olive and Olive learns
those card tricks from him.

i. Louanna
Louanna is a flat character. She is Olive’s cousin, daughter of Auntie Pat
and Uncle Ricky.

CHARACTERIZATION

 What Olive Do
At the first chapter of the story, it can be inferred that Olive is a
considerate person. After noticing how her mother gets upset
whenever she eats pickles, she started hiding her stash of pickles.
Given that Olive feels that she is different from the rest of her family,
she doesn’t declare empty phrases and keep her thoughts and doubts
within her. She carefully observes everything around her till she
proves that what she thinks is true. Olive doesn’t act easily out from
her emotions. There was one time when Stella said to her “Sometimes I
wonder how you can be related to us.” Olive knows that that was a
joke and it did hurt her a bit but she chose not to talk back. There are
times when Olive seems to get neglected by her family just like how
she wasn’t noticed by her family coming home from Stella’s
 championship game. She stayed quiet and didn’t say a word. Also,
Olive is somehow weird because of how she likes reading obituaries
first. Throughout the story, Olive has always been subtle and careful
with her actions and words towards finding out the truth about her
father. Nearing the end of the story, Olive became more determined
and was able to defy her mother forbidding her of doing things that
might lead her to DB Tempo.

 How Olive Relate to Others

Olive is well – aware of how different she is from the rest of her
family. Regardless of this, Olive still treats her family right. She
maintains her relationship with her Mom even if her Mom doesn’t tell
her everything she wanted to know about her father. She stops asking
whenever her Mom tells her to stop. She also maintains her
relationship with her cousins especially to Stella as she tried to listen to
Stella’s stories and attempted to comfort her when she noticed Stella’s
problem. Even with her uncles, Olive gets along with them very well.
Regardless of all the times that doubts cloud Olive’s mind, never did
she treated her family wrong. She always stayed quiet and observant
around her, testing the waters.

 What Olive Think and Feel/ What Olive Say and How Olive Say It
In the novel, it can be noticed that Olive is more of a thinker than a
talker. She chooses to say quite a few words to others than actually say
what she is thinking. Her mind is too loud but nothing comes out from
her mouth. She feels too different from the rest of her family but she
doesn’t actually say anything about this matter. She didn’t complain or
even say a word when her family watches sports games that she
knows nothing about. She just keeps her distance. “I have learnt to see
my family this way: as a separate thing apart from me.”, as what Olive
say. Olive learned how to adjust whenever she feels too different. She
found a way how to be comfortable and to feel less hurt and it is to
always walk a few steps behind her family. Olive is very sensitive
towards other people. She doesn’t say things that may pop the bubble
suddenly within their house. She asks but never forced out
information from anyone in their house. She only asks questions from
her Mom and never from the other people in their house even if she
could’ve easily done that. She never got angry whenever her questions
weren’t answered. She’s just there, carefully and gently digging the
truth about her father.
  Roles Olive Play in the Plot
Olive is a daughter, a cousin, a friend, and she’s the invisible glue
that still binds her mother and father’s pasts.
She is a daughter who constantly understands her mother, not
pressing questions when her Mom tells her not to ask or know
anything about her father. A daughter that became her mother’s
strength. A daughter gently and subtly seeking answers about her
father and the reason for her lack of one.
She is a cousin who’s still willing to hangout and listen to Stella and
Louanna amidst all the growing list of differences they have starting
from physical characteristics down to the sports she can actually play.
A cousin that does not let the differences she feels affect how she treats
Stella and Louanna.
Even if Olive likes solitude, she is still a friend to Hanna Belle
whom she likes having around. An understanding friend that thinks
that the distance is the thing that makes things between her and HB.
Lastly, she is the invisible glue that binds her mother and father, a
glue that will always be there even if connections are always being cut
off by the things that happened in the past.

 As the Author Describes Olive

The author describes Olive as a big – haired, brown – skinned, and
clumsy fourteen – year – old girl struggling to find out what it
means to be different.

III. PLOT

Conflict

External Conflict (Olive versus Her Mom)

This conflict arose when Olive’s Mom always tries to shutdown Olive
when she starts to dig information about her Father but apparently, no one in
their house tells Olive about anything about her Father or the reason for her lack
of one.

Internal Conflict (Olive versus Herself)

Olive’s conflict within herself is primarily surrounding on how different
she feels compared to her family from liking pickles down to how different she is
from her family in physical attributes.
Freytag’s Pyramid
Climax

Rising Action Falling Action

Exposition Resolution

Exposition
The author introduced the 2 key characters in the story in the first chapter
of the book (Jars), Olive the protagonist and Olive’s Mom. The whole family of
Olive lives in a village in Commonwealth District.

Rising Action
The rising action in the story is when Olive opened several boxes her Lola
Celi filled with things that her grandma thinks she can use in the future. When
she opened her fourth box, “a box that seems never to have been opened”, she
found a pink slip with a DB Tempo written in it with cans of refried beans inside
the box. Olive decides to cook the beans. Her Mom witnesses this and asks Olive
what she’s doing. Olive is determined to satisfy her curiosity and asks about
Tempo’s Tacos and someone named DB Tempo. Her Mom forbids her from
knowing further and the scene ends with Olive slamming the cans and walking
out.

Climax
The climax started when Olive started getting directions to get to Tempo’s
Tacos and mutters to herself “I try to be good with directions.” She walked an
hour and a half to get to that store. Upon arriving to Tempo’s Tacos, she goes in
and a tall, dark – skinned with a curly hair man came into her view. She asks him
“Are you DB Tempo?” followed by Olive introducing herself as Alba Guerrero’s
daughter. She threw a few questions on DB Tempo. Not being able to take
 everything positively, Olive runs out of the store without DB Tempo even
chasing after her.

Falling Action
This is where Olive’s Mom tells her everything about DB Tempo, her
father. Her Mom tells her about how they first met, the moments her mother and
DB Tempo shared showing Olive pictures from a shiny black box and most
importantly, the reason why DB Tempo left. After that, Olive understands
everything and she really means it this time.

Resolution
Olive’s Mom tells her that her father is the one who named her Olive.
Olive asks her Mom to drive her back to the taco shack. She doesn’t mind going
to DB Tempo because she wants to be good at this thing even if her father isn’t.

IV. POINT OF VIEW

The story is told on a first person point of view. Olive, the protagonist and the
main character is the one telling the story. Olive makes us experience all the happenings
in the story through her perspective or to put it simply, through her eyes. We only
know Olive’s perspective on the things and events on the story and we will not know
anything unless Olive personally experienced it. This may be best portrayed with how
her Mom reacted to Olive liking pickles. We only know Olive’s side on this incident,
how she feels whenever how her Mom seems to get upset when she eats pickles but
there is no way we can find out what her Mom thinks or feels about that. We can only
know her Mom’s reactions based from what Olive sees. Another is when Olive tries to
ask her Mom about her father and the reason for her lack of one. As a reader, we tend to
feel sympathetic towards Olive based on how she expresses what she feels every single
time her mother shots this topic down and finds it hard for us to understand her
mother’s side for the reason that we only know Olive’s perspective on things.

V. THEME
The theme of What Things Mean is about the struggle of feeling different from
others, the journey to self – discovery, and finding truths that are highly significant to
one’s self. Olive, a fourteen – year – old girl, with her quiet and subtle approach to
uncovering things as to why she is so different from her family shows a different kind
of strength a person can possess. The story gently teaches us significant truths about
ourselves and how important it is to find your place within your family and feel
secured about it. With Olive’s inquisitive mind and an eager spirit, she was able to
make us feel what she’s feeling throughout the story.