HEROES OF THE FRONTIER

Dave Eggers
 A BOOK REVIEW OF HEROES OF THE FRONTIER
WRITTEN BY DAVE EGGERS

In partial fulfillment of the requirements for 21st Century Literature from the Philippines
and the World

Submitted by
John Wyll I. Ugpo
HUMSS 11-B

Submitted to
Ms. Kristienne Jane T. Sarto

March 14, 2018

 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I would like to thank to my parents who supported me to do the task of Book Review and
also gave me money to buy a book for my project. Also to my teachers ma’am Jewel and
ma’am Sarto who teach me to do the task and well trained for this activity. For my
friends thank you for joining me to buy a book and enjoy around the store. The National
Book Store for having a book for my project and assistance to pick a good novel that I
will inspire and learned from it.
 TABLE OF CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION............................................................................................................1

Author’s Background…………………………………………………………………..2

Characters………….....……………………………………………………………......9

Settings of the Story…………... ……………………...………………………...…...10

Summary of the Story……………………...……………..………………………...…11

Analysis of the Story…………………………………………………………………..12

References…..................................................................................................................13
 INTRODUCTION

In spite of its picaresque structure, the novel has a strong sense of urgency: how long can
our heroine keep moving, keep resisting the demands of civilisation? And as Josie’s
behaviour grows more wayward, the reader’s sympathy is balanced by a concern that she
is on the verge of losing it entirely.
“Fiction,” wrote the philosopher Richard Rorty, “gives us the details about kinds of
suffering being endured by people to whom we had previously not attended.” In earlier
books, Eggers merged reportage and fiction to tell the story of child soldiers in What is
the What, or a survivor of Hurricane Katrina in Zeitoun. Here, he gives us a specific
American parent in detail so credible that much of it feels reported, a woman tormented
by her own punitive conscience. At the same time, Josie is an Everymum, whose hopes
and struggle will strike a chord with anyone who has tried to balance the contradictions
of parenthood – the terrible responsibility of being a friend, mentor, teacher, slave and
magistrate – as well as anyone who has flirted with the possibility of an entirely fresh
start.
 AUTHOR’S BACKGROUND
Dave Eggers (born March 12, 1970) is an American writer, editor, and publisher. He is
the husband of writer Vendela Vida with whom he has two children. He wrote the best-
selling memoir A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius. Eggers is also the founder
of McSweeney's, a literary journal, a co-founder of the literacy project 826 Valencia and
the human rights nonprofit Voice of Witness, and the founder of ScholarMatch, a
program that matches donors with students needing funds for college tuition. His writing
has appeared in several magazines. Eggers was born in Boston, Massachusetts, one of
four siblings. His father, John K. Eggers (1936–1991), was an attorney, while his mother,
Heidi McSweeney Eggers (1940–1992), was a school teacher. His father was Protestant
and his mother was Catholic. When Eggers was still a child, the family moved to the
suburb of Lake Forest, near Chicago, where he attended high school and was a classmate
of actor Vince Vaughn. Eggers attended the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign,
intending to get a degree in journalism.[1] However, his studies were interrupted by the
deaths of both of his parents: his father in 1991 from brain and lung cancer, and his
mother in January 1992 from stomach cancer. Both were in their 50s.
These events were chronicled in his first book, the fictionalized A Heartbreaking Work of
Staggering Genius. At the time, Eggers was 21, and his younger brother, Christopher
("Toph"), was 8 years old. The two eldest siblings, Bill and Beth, were unable to commit
to care for Toph; his older brother had a full-time job and his sister was enrolled in law
school. As a result, Dave Eggers took the responsibility. He left the University of Illinois
and moved to Berkeley, California, with his girlfriend Kirsten and his brother. They
initially moved in with Eggers' sister, Beth, and her roommate, but eventually found a
place in another part of town, which they paid for with money left to them by their
parents. Toph attended a small private school, and Eggers did temp work and freelance
graphic design for a local newspaper. Eventually, with his friend David Moodie, he took
over a local free newspaper called Cups. This gradually evolved into the satirical
magazine Might.
Eggers lives in the San Francisco Bay Area and is married to Vendela Vida, also a writer.
The couple have two children.
Eggers's elder brother, Bill, is a researcher who has worked for several conservative think
tanks, doing research promoting privatization. Eggers's sister, Beth, died of suicide in
November 2001. Eggers briefly spoke about his sister's death during a 2002 fan interview
for McSweeney's.
He was one of three 2008 TED Prize recipients.] His TED Prize wish was for helping
community members to personally engage with local public schools. The same year, he
was named one of "50 Visionaries Who Are Changing the World" by Utne Reader. In
2005, he was awarded an honorary Doctor of Letters from Brown University. He
delivered the baccalaureate address at the school in 2008.
Literary work
Eggers began writing as a Salon.com editor and founded Might magazine in San
Francisco in the early 1990s with David Moodie and Marny Requa, while also writing a
comic strip called Smarter Feller (originally Swell) for SF Weekly. Might evolved out of
the small San Francisco-based independent paper Cups, and gathered a loyal following
with its irreverent humour and quirky approach to the issues and personalities of the day.
An article purporting to be an obituary of former 1980s child star Adam Rich (originally
intended to be Back to the Future star Crispin Glover, until Glover backed-out) garnered
some national attention. The magazine regularly included humour pieces, and a number
of essays and non-fiction pieces by seminal 1990s writers, including "Impediments to
Passion", an essay on sex in the AIDS era by David Foster Wallace.
However, as Eggers later recounted in his memoir, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering
Genius, the magazine consistently struggled to make a profit, and finally ceased
publication in 1997. An anthology of the best of Might magazine's brief run, 'Shiny
Adidas Tracksuits and the Death of Camp' and Other Essays from Might Magazine, was
published in late 1998. By this time, Eggers was freelancing for Esquire magazine and
continuing to work for Salon.

Visual art work

While at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, Eggers attended art classes. After
the publication of A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, he focused mainly on
writing, but publicly returned to visual art with a solo gallery show at Electric Works,
San Francisco, in 2010, called "It Is Right to Draw Their Fur." The show featured many
drawings of animals often paired with phrases, sometimes out of the Bible. In
conjunction with that exhibition, McSweeney's published a catalog featuring 25 loose-
leaf prints of the work featured in the show. In 2015 Eggers had his first solo museum
exhibition at the Nevada Museum of Art called "The Insufferable Throne of
God". Eggers is represented by Electric Works a fine art gallery in San Francisco.
Outside of exhibitions, Eggers' visual art contributions include the following:

 Provided album art for Austin rock group Paul Banks & the Carousels' album Yelling
at the Sun.
 Designed the artwork for Thrice's album Vheissu.

Awards and honors

 2000 Time Best Book of the Year, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius
 2001 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction finalist, A Heartbreaking Work of
Staggering Genius
 2008 TED Prize
 " Best of list, Zeitoun
 2010 American Book Award, Zeitoun
 2010 Northern California Book Award (Creative Nonfiction) nomination, Zeitoun
 2010 Dayton Literary Peace Prize, Zeitoun
 2011 International Dublin Literary Award longlist, The Wild Things
 2012 National Book Award (Fiction) finalist, A Hologram for the King[38]
 2012 A Hologram for the King named in the 10 Best Books of 2012 list by editors
of The New York Times Book Review
 2012 A Hologram for the King included in Publishers Weekly Best Books of 2012 list
 2012 Commonwealth Club Inforum's 21st Century Award
 2013 California Book Award (Fiction)finalist, A Hologram for the
King2014 International Dublin Literary Award longlist, A Hologram for the King
 2015 International Dublin Literary Award longlist, The Circle
 2015 Inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters
 2018 International Dublin Literary Award shortlist, Your Fathers, Where Are They?
And the Prophets, Do They Live Forever?
 CHARACTERS

Josie
Josie is the protagonist of Heroes of the Frontier. She is 40 years old and the mother of
two young children, Paul and Ana. Josie takes her children and runs away to Alaska
where they drive around somewhat aimlessly in an old, rented RV.
Paul
Paul is the son of Josie at age of 8 years old.
Anna
Anna is the daughter of Josie at age of 5 years old.
 SETTINGS OF THE STORY

Alaska
Josie flees to the state of Alaska with her children when her life in Ohio becomes too
difficult for her to bear. She hopes to find a state full of heroic people and beauty.
However, when she arrives in Alaska, she decides it does not look much different than
Ohio and she wonders where the heroic people are. While she is there, the state is
wracked by wildfires. Josie twice finds herself running away from the fires: once while
driving the Chateau and once when she is evacuated while at a musician’s house.
The Chateau
The Chateau is an old RV that Josie rents to travel around Alaska. The vehicle is not in
good shape. The engine cannot go faster than 48 miles per hour and it is a bit rickety. She
and the kids live in the Chateau most of the time that they are in Alaska.
 SUMMARY OF THE STORY

The story begins with Josie having taken her two young children, Paul and Ana, to
Alaska without informing their father, Carl. Josie is fed up with her life back in Ohio and
with Carl, who is planning to marry his current girlfriend though he had always refused to
marry Josie. Josie has also recently lost her dental practice as the result of a lawsuit.
Additionally, Josie feels responsible for the death of a young man named Jeremy who
had enlisted in the military after Josie encouraged him to do so. He was killed in the line
of duty.Josie, Paul, and Ana are driving around Alaska in a rented Chateau RV. Josie
plans to go visit Sam, whom she refers to as her stepsister. In reality, Josie and Sam grew
up together in Sunny’s house after having emancipated themselves. The audience is not
impressed by the majority of the magic, so Josie claps more loudly to make up for them.
Charlie gets misty-eyed when one act is able to guess where he is from by his postal
code.
Josie and the children arrive at Sam’s house. At first, Josie thinks Sam really has her life
together since she has beautiful children and her house is organized. However, when Sam
takes Josie to a bar and Josie discovers that Sam is having an affair with an elderly man
that Josie finds deplorable, Josie rethinks her opinion. She leaves the bar and is pushed
off the road by a truck as she is walking to Sam’s house. She wakes up in the hospital and
Sam tells her that the hospital called Carl. The next morning Josie takes the children and
leaves.As they are driving, Paul sees a sign for an archery place and Josie stops. It is
closed but she allows the children to play and shoot arrows. Another couple, Kyle and
Angie, drives up in a truck carrying a small house in the bed.. The guest cabin is open, so
Josie and the children sleep there for the night. When the proprietor does not return, they
stay another night, but are awakened during the night by an angry man who goes to the
main house to call the police. Josie and the children run to the Chateau and drive
away.Josie next stops at an RV park owned by a handsome man named Jim. A family is
having a wedding there. Josie finds a silver mine and she and the kinds go there to
explore. When they discover the mine is shut down and the caretaker’s cabin is empty,
Josie breaks a window and they stay in the cabin for a few days.
She and the children are very happy there. One day they go into town for food and Josie
meets a group of musicians. She asks one of them, Cooper, to help her write down some
of the music that is in her head. While she and the children are at Cooper’s house, the
town is evacuated. Josie and the children end up at a shelter in a school.The people at the
shelter give Josie the opportunity to make a phone call, so she calls Carl. Carl did not
serve her the papers and he is not angry at her. The papers were from a class action
lawsuit against a power company that Josie was involved in.Josie takes the children for a
walk and they decide to go see a mountain lake. It begins to storm and the lightning is
dangerous. Josie and the children run on toward a shelter by the lake. They finally arrive
and find that the shelter there has been set up for a party that never happened. They eat
some of the food and let their clothing dry. Josie has the feeling that she is finally right
where she belongs.
 ANALYSIS OF THE STORY

Life is Chaotic
The idea that life is chaotic is present in the many events that occur in Josie’s life that are
either random or disruptive, and sometimes both. Josie leaves Ohio in the first place
because she feels like her life has fallen into chaos. She has lost her dental practice and
the father of her children is marrying someone else. Her daily life, while she sees it as
drudgery, is fast paced and full of drama.
Josie tries to escape the chaos of her life by running away to Alaska, but the chaos of life
cannot be escaped. Josie’s daughter Ana is herself a source of chaos since she is always
breaking things or putting herself in dangerous conditions. That in decision to vacation
with the family you must sure that those place is safe and allowed so your vacation with
your family is happy and fun.
 REFERENCES

Published in the United States by Vintage Books, a division of Penguin Random House
LLC, New York, Originally published hardcover in the United States by Alfred A.
Knopf, a division of Penguin Random House LLC, New York, in 2016.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_Eggers

http://www.chicagotribune.com/lifestyles/books/ct-prj-heroes-of-the-frontier-dave-
eggers-20160803-story.html