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Jun 23, 2020jazminefinuliar04 rated this title 3.5 out of 5 stars
East of Eden, written by renowned author John Steinbeck revolves around the lives of three generations of two interwoven families, better known as the Trasks and the Hamiltons. The Trasks, which consist of Cyrus and Alice and their two sons Charles and Adam live a life that reflects the biblical story of Adam and Eve’s sons Cain and Abel, and how the two are such polar opposites that they eventually begin to have an impact on each other’s lives, with Cain representing evil, and Abel representing good. This story eventually passes on and reflects the relationship between Adam’s twin sons Caleb “Cal” and Aron. One thing I liked about the book in particular is that the novel shows the significance of identity, and the demonstrations of appearance versus reality. This is evident in the life of the Hamilton family patriarch Samuel “Sam” Hamilton who is from Ireland, in which being an Irishman wasn’t well-acclaimed in America at the time, and the Trask family’s servant Lee being Chinese-American, which makes it difficult for him to conform to the American expectations of broken, accented English. Although it helps describe the setting of the novel, it was difficult to read through the tiny details of the environment of the Salinas Valley in my opinion. Overall, the novel was very moving to me, and made me very emotional as I read more of the chapters.