How The Garcia Girls Lost Their Accent Theme Analysis

There are many themes in this New York Times bestseller How The Garcia Girls Lost Their Accent by Julia Alvarez, though one stands out from all the rest. That is, that happiness is not having what you want, but wanting what you have. Throughout the novel, this theme takes its place in character development, setting and thus affects the overall plot. This theme has a massive effect on the characters in this novel. One example of how this theme effects the characters is in Part 3 in the chapter “An American Surprise.”At the beginning of the chapter, Papi brings home electric piggy banks for the girls from New York. At the time, Carla really likes the idea of having this amazing toy, but then she soon realizes that it isn’t all that great, and that there are others who want it much more. She takes her toy to Gladys, and even though the kind maid offers to pay with money, Carla refuses to let her and gives it to her …show more content…
A huge part of the story was when Yoyo was in a mental hospital. The family moved to the US to find happiness. They wanted to have so much. They wanted to be popular, rich (not the lowest class), adjusted and bilingual. Though they had a very difficult time acquiring even one of those things. Yoyo was in a Mental Hospital because of the hardships of living in a different country (love (mostly), language, fitting in, etc.) and just hardships in general, “what you need is a goddam shrink!” said by John to Yolanda(Alvarez 73).This affects the setting because one of the most influential parts of the story (the ominous, black bird in the window) occurs during a setting change when the story changes from the perspective of them in a city, to them in a hospital, all because of moving to the US due to Mami and Papi’s want for a better life.This theme is present in almost all important scenarios in this story, though, obviously, plays a decisive role in the setting of this