Choke Character Analysis

I am reading Choke by Diana López and I am on page one hundred twenty six. So far in the novel, there are two best friends who meet a new girl named Nina. Nina teaches only one of the girls a game she plays and now the girl, Windy, is part of “the breath sisters” a dangerous game, which can ruin a person. I am planning on predicting the future of Elena and Windy’s relationship and evaluating Nina as a character.

In this journal, I will be predicting that Elena and Windy will become distanced from each other and terminate their friendship now that Nina is in their lives. To begin, Windy already likes Nina’s presence in her life more than she does Elena’s. In the novel, Windy and Nina always agree, but Windy and Elena have trouble agreeing.
Windy, Elena, and Nina are having a conversation about how Courtney’s speech was not pleasant and Windy starts by saying, “’Her hair looked like seaweed didn’t it?’ ‘Yeah,’ Nina said ‘Serves her right, though’ ‘I can’t believe your being so meanormous,’ said Elena” (López 54). From the conversation these girls were having, one could understand that Nina and Windy tend to agree with each other more than Windy and Elena. During this conversation, Nina and Windy connected and completely disregarded Elena’s beliefs. Next, Windy would rather spend time with Nina instead of her best friend Elena. Windy was with Elena and Nina and she decided to walk Nina to the bus stop instead of continuing her tradition of walking Elena to the bus stop so she said, “I think I’ll wait with Nina today” (López 57). In the novel, Windy decided to break the tradition Elena and herself had always had together. One can understand that Windy values her relationship with Nina more than she does Elena by the way she is acting and she would much rather spend her time with Nina instead of hanging out with Elena. Lastly, when Windy came apart of Nina’s secret “breath sisters” club she felt as if she had just won a Nobel Prize. After Windy played the choking game she felt special and said, “When I heard this, I wasn’t confused anymore. Nina was my friend now- more than that, my breath sister” (López 96). To Windy, being a breath sister to Nina was a main priority in her life now. This label given to Windy made her feel loved and important after she was apart of the general public for all of her life. Suddenly, the feeling Windy was given made her realize that Nina is her best friend and Elena is not. Not only does Windy like Elena more, but also Elena embarrasses Windy, which has caused their relationship to decline rapidly. To begin, whenever any small word was spoken out of Elena’s mouth to Nina, Windy felt extremely embarrassed. Windy thinks about Elena saying unnecessary things to Nina and says, “Sometimes, Elena didn’t know when to keep her mouth shut” (López 124).
As one reads this quote they can analyze that Windy is sick of Elena ruining her new friendship with Nina by embarrassing her. Windy did not appreciate the fact that Elena felt like she needed to chime in to every conversation Windy and Nina had. Secondly, because of the friendship Elena and Windy have, they both get picked on for Elena’s nerdy activities. Windy recalls tripping on ice in front of the whole cafeteria, which was Elena’s fault and says, “Honestly Elena couldn’t even inline skate so I knew she’d humiliate us somehow. And this wasn’t the first time either” (López 21). One can understand that Windy is frustrated with Elena because Elena always tends to embarrass both herself and Windy. Windy is trying so hard to be in the in crowd but because of Elena’s foolish ideas, Windy is having a challenging time being apart of the in crowd. As a final point, the fact that Elena has not become mature yet bothers Windy. Windy describes Elena and says, “I keep waiting for her to out grow it, but Elena likes to hold on to things, not just habits but actual things” (López 6). As one comprehends this statement they can understand that Windy is
sick of Elena’s nonsense, and she just wants Elena to grow up and be mature. Having to grow up and change habits is hard for Elena because changing what she has known her whole life would ruin her. However, Elena is willing to do anything to keep the relationship Windy and herself have. One can predict Elena and Windy will not be friends anymore because Windy enjoys Nina’s presence more and Windy thinks Elena is a nerd.

In this journal, I will be evaluating the character of Nina in the novel Choke.
In the first place, Nina is friendly. When Nina started at a new school she did not just try to squeeze her way into the popular crown. Instead, Nina decided to become friends with people who were just average human beings and were nothing special. Windy talks about how nice Nina is to her and Elena and says, “We’d never had an in-crowd worthy friend before” (López 20). From this statement one can understand that Nina is meant to be popular but instead she would rather be a friend to average people who have above average personalities. Nina cares about the people in the general public and not just a social status or the cool table at lunch. Secondly, while people are giving their speeches Nina claps for the people who did not do as well as the others. Windy thinks about how her speech was bad but yet Nina applauded her and said, “I’ve never been applauded before. I knew my speech was crappy, but I felt like a celebrity” (López 44). As a result of clapping for everyone, Nina made people feel as if they are important and they matter. Nina does not care if anyone had a crappy speech, so she claps for him or her to make him or her feel like his or her speech was magnificent. Next, Nina protects people when they fall down. After Windy and Elena slip on ice Nina helps them up and says, “No problem, every school has mean girls like that. If you let them get to you, they just act worse. Eventually,
someone will put them in their place” (López 24). From this quote one can understand that Nina is just trying to help the girls and be friendly to them. Nina wants the girls to know that she will be there for them and stand up for them when someone picks on them. In the novel, one could evaluate Nina’s as manipulative. First of all, Nina lies to Windy’s face and does not care. Windy thought that Nina’s mom was picking them up but then Windy finds out she has to take the bus home and says, “My parents think your mom is picking us up. They think they’ll meet her” (López 98). As one reads this quote they can understand that Windy is frustrated because Nina lied right to her face. Windy is mad because she was excited to meet Nina’s mom and now she has to take the bus home by herself. Secondly, Nina forces Windy to lie to her parents. Windy is nervous about lying to her parents and says, “I’m not good at lying. My parents can read me” (López 99). One can analyze this and understand that Windy feels uncomfortable lying to her parents but is willing to for Nina. Nina has brainwashed Windy to think that it is okay to lie to your parents and Windy trusts Nina, so she follows whatever Nina wants. Lastly, Nina makes Windy keep a big secret from Elena. Windy thinks about having to keep the choking game a secret from Elena and said, “I have never considered keeping a secret from her” (López 91). From this quote one can perceive that Windy does not feel right about keeping a secret from Elena. Elena is Windy’s best friend and Windy is nervous about keeping her first secret from Elena. The only reason Windy is keeping the secret is because she wants to impress Nina and get to be Nina’s best friend. In the final analysis, Nina has the traits of friendly and manipulative.

In conclusion, I would give this journal a 14.2/15 because I tried to fix all the mistakes I had on my last journal. I believe I did well with transitions and had good flow. All in all, I feel like this journal was well written and I tried to do well on my last journal of the year. I believe for next year, I can improve my grammar and analysis.