S.E Hinton's "The Outsiders"

          The Outsiders is a book written by S.E Hinton. The copyright date is 1967; renewed in 1995. Here is a short review and summary of The Outsiders.
          Ponyboy is a 13 year old boy in a gang called The Greasers. This gang is from the east side of town, which is the poor side of town. The immediate people The Greasers are Ponyboy, Johnny, Two-Bit, Darry, Dally, Sodapop, and Steve. Johnny is Ponyboy's best friend. Sodapop is Ponyboy's brother, and Steve is Sodapop's best friend. Darry is also Ponyboy's brother, but he treats Ponyboy like an ignorant child. Lastly, Dally is the worst of the gang, who's gone to jail more times than anyone else. Things are not bad for The Greasers, except for their frequent fights and ongoing gang war with The Socs, another gang. They are from the west side of town, and they are the rich ones. One night, while Johnny and Ponyboy are out, they run into some Socs, and a fight breaks out, leaving one person dead. Johnny and Ponyboy have to make a run for it, but they have to be quick. Before they know it, they are at Dally's house asking for advice and pleading for supplies. He gives them a gun, and tells them that they have to leave immediately, get on a train upstate, and get off at a stop where there is an old, abandoned church in the woods. The two boys set off immediately, and look ahead towards a much unexpected and intense future.
          The conflict in this book is internal mostly; the conflicts exist in both Johnny and Ponyboy. Ponyboy is conflicted about his feelings about everything that was going on in their lives. He is conflused about how to take it that they were on the run for murder, and also about the obvious moral conflict of being horrified and guitly about comitting murder. As for Johnny, who also has an internal conflict. He does not feel as much guilt as Ponyboy, but moreso he has fear about how much leagal trouble that he would be in once he was caught. He also feels conflicted about leaving his friends behind, and leaving his whole life behind.
          The theme in this book is gang wars. Only a small portion of this book has been explained in this review. Once the story starts to pick up speed, more happens than the two boys just hiding in the old church. It's theme is mainly about violence among gangs and how the stupidest things can result in deaths. It can also be used as a metaphor for the real world's wars, explaining how people can get into small fights about something, and then how it can expand into the taking of many lives. Bringing that to a smaller scale, you could get the plot of The Outsiders.
          I thought that this book was fair. I normally don't like books with this type of storyline and theme, but I thought that it was pretty good, and parts of it spoke to me. The tone of the story was slightly upbeat, but as the story progresses, it becomes solid, and is written as if the author was someone that has become hardened over time. There are some references to poems in it, and I thought that was a good adition to the story. Other than that, I have nothing left to say about it. Thanks for reading Tune in later!