Nothing Like the Movies

Content Warning: This section discusses the death of a parent.

Wes is one of the main characters and first-person narrators of the novel. The chapters titled with his first name are written from his perspective. In the narrative present, Wes is 20 years old and restarting his college career at UCLA. Two years prior, Wes’s dad, Stuart, died from a heart attack, for which Wes continues to blame himself. Although Stuart encouraged Wes’s baseball career, he also pressured Wes too hard and caused him to become angry with his overbearing parenting and coaching style. Wes spent the two years following Stuart’s death living at home in Omaha, Nebraska, working two full-time jobs, paying the family’s mortgage and bills, and caring for his grieving mother and younger sister, Sarah. In the present, Wes is trying to reclaim his former identity by returning to college and rejoining the Bruins baseball team. However, his grief and guilt surrounding his dad’s death continue to linger. This leaves emotions unprocessed in Wes’s internal world.

Wes is a determined and driven character. He wants to throw himself “into every single moment” of his life and embrace his present and future (11).