54 pages • 1 hour read
Walter Dean MyersMonster
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 1999A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Character Analysis
Steve Harmon
Steve is a 16-year-old Black high school student who, prior to his incarceration, lived at home with his parents and younger brother in Harlem, New York. He is the main character in Monster and the person to whom the title refers (the prosecutor insinuates that Steve is a “monster” in her opening statements of his trial). Steve tells the story using multiple genres. Prior to the events that resulted in his incarceration, he had been a videographer and hoped to pursue making movies as a career and as his way of interpreting the world around him. He copes with the surreal world of the prison and trial by fantasizing that he is living in a movie of his own creation. He authors a screenplay depicting his experience of the trial and being incarcerated, but he is most candid when he shares his deepest thoughts, fears, and hopes in his journal, which he writes in the first person.
In the seven months since his arrest, Steve has lived in the Manhattan Detention Center. As a prisoner, Steve lives in fear. He is aware of what he needs to do to avoid physical violence and assault by other inmates of the facility, which he describes in detail. Steve misses his family and takes full advantage of the few visits they share. He writes about the stress he sees in his mother and the changes he sees in his father. He fears his dad has lost faith in him and his innocence. In his journal, Steve often assures himself he is innocent, but he also expresses ambivalence and contradictions about the events that led to his arrest.
Steve knows and has dealt in various ways with the others involved in the trial, as well as those who have taken a plea deal with the prosecutors to lessen their jail time. He has no respect for these individuals, though he walks a fine line in his dealings with them as instructed by his attorney, attempting neither to be lumped in with them in the eyes of the jury, nor to attack them and undermine the credibility of the other defendant and his lawyer.
Kathy O’Brien
Kathy, Steve’s defense attorney, is a small, white woman with red hair and freckles, an Irish-Catholic native New Yorker with a great deal of legal experience. Incarceration separates Steve from his family and teachers, making Kathy his main ally. This is problematic for Steve because he senses that she doubts his innocence, even as she provides a robust defense and counsels him to act in his best interest. Whenever Steve seeks encouragement from his attorney, she responds with realism, honestly stating the gravity of the charges against him.
Though Kathy is clearly giving her best to defending Steve, she forms no emotional bond with him. She has only given Steve the simplest account of her schooling with no other details of her life. Only on one occasion, when Steve asks her what she is going to do over the weekend, does she give any sort of personal response: She is going to watch her niece play a baseball game. The full extent of her lack of connection with Steve is revealed when the jury acquits him and Kathy refuses to embrace Steve, shake his hand, or extend any sort of congratulatory expression. Conversely, Kathy does relate personally with the prosecutor, as Steve watches the two of them speaking privately and sharing a laugh.
Sandra Petrocelli
As Kathy is the embodiment of a classic defense attorney, prosecutor Sandra Petrocelli is the epitome of a New York Assistant District Attorney. Like her rival, Sandra functions smoothly in her role. She avoids making any statement that would humanize the two defendants in the eyes of the jury, works to portray the co-defendants as a unified team, and from the beginning insinuates that Steve–whom she does not personally know–is a monster. Sandra is described as dark-haired, dark-eyed, intense, business-like, and attractive.
Prosecuting the two defendants for murder is a task with which she is familiar and at which she is adept. Throughout the trial, she walks the fine edge of ethical prosecution, implying certain allegations about the defendants that have not been stated, asserting connections for which no evidence has been introduced, and asking questions of witnesses–especially Steve–that are leading and manipulative.
James King
James King, Steve’s co-defendant, is a 23-year-old Black Harlem resident who is referred to on the street as King. He is a menacing presence among Steve’s circle of associates. Steve found King to be threatening before the two were incarcerated. In their private encounter during the trial, however, when King tries to intimidate him with a snarl, Steve comes to perceive King as laughable in the face of so many other fearful realities.
Prior to being locked up, King constantly complains about his lack of money. He openly discusses the various possibilities of committing an ideal crime that would easily net him a lot of cash–a crime he refers to as a “get over.” He seeks to intimidate Steve and the 14-year-old Osvaldo into taking minor roles in perpetrating what he portrays as a simple robbery. Throughout the narrative, King exudes a cavalier attitude, including his casual response to the possibility that he will face a lengthy prison sentence or even the death penalty.
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By Walter Dean Myers
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