As I read this book I found myself so very grateful for my own sheltered childhood. I hope that Baby will someday find happiness and normality in her life, …show more content…
I believe the author wrote it with my generation in mind, to educate privileged people about just how bad some people have it. When you meet someone on the street you cannot just treat them without respect right off the bat. You must try and put yourself in their place. Lullabies for Little Criminals is written from Baby's perspective, she uses first person voice to describe her feelings and experiences. This paints a vivid mental picture of Baby's psyche, and makes the reader feel as if they are experiencing everything with her. The author writes with a plethora of similes when Baby describes her situation. I think she chose to do this to really illustrate that Baby is a smart girl. Baby sees a situation as more than just the sum of it's parts. For example in certain stressful situations Baby removes herself mentally and focuses on one aspect, like the colour of someone's lipstick or the feeling of the wind. It is a stylistic choice used by the author with great effectiveness. Though she is intelligent, she is a troubled girl. Her strange childhood is not without consequence, in fact she is clinically depressed. When a car hit her, she said, "there wasn't much that pain on the outside could do to me at that point" (95). This is evidence to her condition, she is numb to the world. I think that this numbness, along with the peer pressure of her father's addiction, leads her to self-medicate with