The 57 Bus Literary Elements

Narrative Nonfiction, YA, True Crime

Oakland, California, in the early 2010s

Third-person omniscient narrator telling the story from both Sasha and Richard's points of view

Understated, reporterly, urgent (as in a call to action)

Sasha and Richard are both main subjects of the narrative. If there is an "antagonist," it could be the remnants of the justice system that still reflect the "super-predator" myth of the 1990s.

Richard sets fire to the hem of Sasha's skirt while they sleep on the 57 bus. During the trial, conflict exists around the question of whether or not Richard committed a hate crime and whether or not he should be charged as an adult.

Richard is sentenced to a seven-year jail term. Another climactic point in the storyline is when Richard and Sasha's stories intersect in the form of the attack, which the reader expects from the beginning.

Richard's attorney keeps Richard's letters to Sasha secret, and this foreshadows Debbie and Karl's inability to have an accurate impression of the remorse he feels.

At the beginning of the book, in the section, "OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA," Slater says that Oakland can sometimes feel like a small town. This is an understatement that demonstrates how people's stories are interconnected.

Slater alludes to Leo Tolstoy's novel Anna Karenina in the first chapter of The 57 Bus. It is the book that Sasha is reading when they fall asleep on the way home from school, and they are clutching it when Richard sets their skirt on fire. The reference to Tolstoy foregrounds Sasha's obsession with all things Russian (Tolstoy was a seminal Russian author).

Oakland is described using language that emphasizes its color and geography; for example, it is said to have beautiful "green and gold hills" which enables the reader to vividly visualize the northern surroundings of the city.

Sasha's tumblr contains a few paradoxes that demonstrate their resistance to binaries. For example, they write, "I like compliments / I dislike compliments" and "I like parties / I dislike parties" (11-12).

The way the book is structured draws an overarching parallel between Sasha and Richard's storylines. Both are teens in Oakland, both are struggling to find their place in the world.

Slater writes that "life had a way of sticking its foot out, sending you sprawling" (65), which anthropomorphizes the concept of "life" and personifies it as something that can stick its foot out and trip people.