Are The Themes In Stephanie Kuehnerts's Ballads Of Suburbia

Stephanie Kuehnerts Ballads of Suburbia takes place within the suburbs. She also works to combine themes of self-harm and emotionally absent parental figures within the novel. These combined themes set the book apart from traditional drug addiction based novels. That and the fact that we meet the protagonist 4 years after her drug overdose. Instead of meeting her before like the characters in the previous novels. Most reviews will point out the use of music within her novel. The use of music adds a personal touch and also makes the novel more relatable.
The main character Kara has a notebook in which she titles “Stories of Suburbia” it’s a notebook with strange and tragic stories from suburbs. This notebook is written by her friends. Kara tells her story which involves drugs, alcohol, music, love, lose, and an overdose. We also
Most of the books here are not easy to read but teach an important lesson. But some believe that knowledge is power and if we don’t educate and if we shelter children too much they will be more prone to fall into the drug scene. In a review of Ballads of Suburbia on a page titled, When she speaks I hear revolution, a feminist blog the blogger states, “By “protecting” children from themes like this, all we are doing is hiding the reality and making them less able to respond in smart ways. Drugs are the forbidden fruit, but knowledge is power, and with knowledge, kids will learn quickly to say “no” (Novak). I think this sums it up very nicely. As much as we want to we can’t remove the temptation of drugs. Drugs will always be around tempting all of us especially those most innocent, children. So we need to do what we can to educated them and prepare them for times when it’s harder to resist. Books like the ones I’ve explored prepare and serve as warnings while also entertaining and making an impact on the literary world and on our minds and