Love

There are many facets to the emotion of love, and this novel incorporates many of them. Love can be passionate, it can be passive, and it can be unrequited. The main love story of this novel is that between Billy and Eva. Billy loves Eva with a passion even the reader can feel through the description of his thoughts and actions. Billy wants to marry her, and wants to bring her back from Ireland so badly that he has indentured himself to Mr. Holtzman to years of working in his store. The reaction of those around him to his passion underlines the depth of his devotion, seen so clearly when Dennis initiates the arrangement with Mr. Holtzman. However, this love is unreciprocated as the reader will later see when Eva marries another man.

Also in the novel are the loves of Dennis and of his mother, Sheila. Sheila...