Why So Many Hardships?

Author’s note: This is a piece about how both books, Pretty Little Liars, and Sarah Bishop relate to the theme of loss of innocence. Both books although show this in different ways. In this piece, I  also provide examples from the books to show specific details.

Have you ever lost someone so close to you, you felt like you couldn’t live without them? That if they weren’t there presently, you weren’t?  Well, this is exactly how two books relate to each other. Both books lost someone very close to them, although they are set in different time periods.  Pretty Little Liars and Sarah Bishop both are based off the theme of loss of innocence, though; they show this in very different ways.

To begin with, both books have the theme of loss of innocence by losing someone. In both books, the main characters in the book lost someone close to them. For example, in the book, Pretty Little Liars, the four main characters lost their best friend, Ali. In Sarah Bishop, Sarah, the main character, lost her father and her brother. A quote from Sarah Bishop that shows this is, “One of the boys had gone off on horseback to fetch Mr. Laurence, the apothecary, but when he arrived, hours afterward, Father was dead”. These books are obviously similar to each other. The deaths of these characters were very hard for all of the main characters in the books.

While having plot lines in each book having to do with people dying is an excellent explanation why Pretty Little Liars and Sarah Bishop both have the theme of loss of innocence, another reason is what the deaths did to the main characters. The girls in Pretty Little Liars were very harmed by the death of their best friend, Ali. They kept wanting her to come back, and they kept acting like it never happened but it really did. Although, in Sarah Bishop she was even more affected because it was her family that died. Sarah though could face the fact that her family was dead. She was a strong girl and she knew she was going to be okay. In both books, they were affected by the deaths, just in dissimilar ways.

Even though both books have some key reasons why the theme is loss of innocence, they are some differences in the book. For example, in Pretty Little Liars, the girls lost their best friend, not their fathers and brothers. Another difference is how the characters died. In Sarah Bishop, Sarah’s brother starved to death as a prisoner in the war. Also, Sarah’s father died because of a fire. The way the characters passed away in Sarah Bishop is way different than in Pretty Little Liars.  The girl’s best friend, Ali, died of a mystery; no one knows how she died. She was found in the ground a few years later after she went missing. A quote that shows this from the book is: “She was under the concrete; they knew it was her from the ring she was wearing. But they’re doing DNA tests to make sure”. No one knew who killed Ali or put her there. The death will always remain anonymity.

As you can see, all these reasons obviously explain why there is a related theme in the two books; although, as you read, they are some differences. Sarah Bishop and Pretty Little Liars are completely different books, but they do show the same theme. They are both really great books. However, which one do you want to read more?