When talking about the plot of Perks of Being a Wallflower, it is a subject that couldn't be more simple and complicated at the same time. At its surface, it is a story about a freshman boy in high school named Charlie. It shows in a first person point of view, where Charlie is the narrator, of the struggles of a teenage boy with more than a few issues. With that said there are layers upon layers of complications in this 21st century teen must-read novel. Charlie has chronic depression and anxiety and is known to black out and do things that are labeled "clinically insane". By the end of the book he finds out his Aunt Helen, whom died while he was young, raped him and was to blame for many of his emotional issues. Between the personal issues unique to Charlie that he went through and the more common high school issues that Charlie was subject to, it made this novel very interesting. During Charlie's experiences in his first year of high school, he meets some of the first close friends he's ever had. These friends include the following. A gay theater enthusiast that has his own romantic issues throughout the book with the quarterback of the local football team named Patrick. A described to be beautiful girl named Sam whom Charlie has very strong affections for throughout the book, and this character could arguably be the biggest main character second to charlie in this novel. Charlies sister a goodie-goodie gone bad whom ends up pregnant toward the end of the book with her abusive boyfriend named Candice. There are many many other characters in Perks of Being a Wallflower who influence Charlies life through the book, but those are the most important.
Themes:
As most teen novels tend to, Perks of Being a Wallflower is no exception to attempting to instill morals and themes to guide the common teen. One of these themes are the harmful side effects of drugs and the slippery slope doing them sets one on. Charlie, the main character, is a heavy smoker a majority of the book regarding cigarettes and often is smoking other substances such as marijuana. While you watch his become dependent on both drugs he also experiments with stronger drugs giving strength to the claim that was stated earlier that is "drugs are a slippery slope". Another prominent theme shown is the benefit of therapy. While reading it is clear that Stephan Chbosky, the author, wanted the reader to relate and realize that therapy can be extremely helpful to emotional issues that teens in particular go through. This can be proven by Charlie having constant emotional issues throughout the book that only seemed to be completely resolved when he saw a therapist and got admitted into the local mental institution. The most obvious theme this book gets across to the reader is that there are always other going through the same issues. The theme of never being alone while facing life's hardships is shoved in the readers face over and over. By putting this story in the first person it only strengthens this claim. This novel is very theme filled and moral heavy, but that adds to the charm of it because without them the book wouldn't have even made it to the shelves of every book store across the nation.