The 57 Bus: A True Story of Two Teenagers and the Crime that Changed Their Lives (2017)

Nonfiction | Book | YA | Published in 2017

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Summary

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Introduction

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Key Figures

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

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Discussion Questions

IntroductionChapter Summaries & Analyses

Introduction Summary

The first pages of the book imagine the moment Sasha and Richard’s lives intersect in real time. The author establishes the scene in the present tense and introduces the two main characters. Slater describes Sasha’s clothing: “a T-shirt, a black fleece jacket, a gray flat cap, and a gauzy white skirt.” Richard is wearing “a black hoodie and an orange-billed New York Knicks hat,” and he has “hazel eyes and a slow, sweet grin” (4).

Slater describes Sasha asleep and Richard horsing around with his friends then interrupts the narrative: “Wait” (4). She presages the violence and consequences to come, including Sasha’s weeks of surgery and Richard’s arrest, then addresses the reader directly:

For now, both teenagers are just taking the bus home from school.

Surely it’s no too late to stop things from going wrong. There must be some way to wake Sasha. Divert Richard. Get the driver to stop the bus.

There must be something you can do (5).

The next pages describe the city of Oakland, California and how it is “a city of stark contrasts” (7). Slater explains how the economy has been impacted by the wealth of the San Francisco area, bringing money and privilege across the bay. She also notes that Oakland has “one of the largest proportions of gay- and lesbian-headed households” in the country (7), but that there is an area, East Oakland, where Richard is from, that is where two-thirds of the city’s murders occurred in 2013.

The 57 bus cuts across the entire city, going through the “middle-class foothills where Sasha lived and Richard went to school” (7-8). The pair are only on the bus together for eight minutes.

Introduction Analysis

Slater uses the introduction to establish the two main characters of the novel, the conflict that will come between them, and to describe the city in which they live. By dividing the introduction into short sections, each barely three pages long, she signals the episodic style she will use throughout the book, which also reflects the random, brief interaction between Sasha and Richard. Each short section has a heading that sometimes describes the section— “Oakland, California” (6)—and will sometimes serve as a commentary on the section.

Narrative non-fiction allows an author more freedom to interpret and editorialize, and Slater uses language to color the reader’s perceptions of the characters and events, as in the way she describes Richard as having a “slow, sweet grin” (4)—these are traits described to make him appealing, which is in direct contrast to his actions moments later. Slater’s goal is to complicate and humanize the characters. Her use of language will alternately lull and alarm the reader, again reflecting the way a seemingly ordinary moment can suddenly turn into an extraordinary one.

In describing Oakland, Slater emphasizes the area’s diversity in race, ethnicity, and the preponderance of gay and lesbian households, but she does not mention that Richard is black and Sasha is white: Slater reports this story as a hate crime based on Sasha’s identification as agender and their preference for wearing skirts. Her secondary focus is on the divisions of class: she describes Richard’s neighborhood in detail—“There’s more trash on the streets, more roaming dogs, more liquor stores, fewer grocery stores” (7)—but not Sasha’s, as if where Richard comes from might be an important factor in his behavior.

The introduction explains exactly what happens between Richard and Sasha and the general consequences of the event—Richard will set Sasha’s skirt on fire; Sasha will endure weeks of painful treatment and recovery; Richard will be “charged with two felonies, each with a hate-crime clause” (4). By providing these key facts in the first pages of the book, Slater is signaling that the real story is not what happened, but why it happened. She also speaks directly to the reader, suggesting her audience is implicit in the crime that occurs. The introduction is meant to shock and disorient the reader, just as the main event of the novel is shocking, disorienting, and, Slater implies, more complicated than it seems.