Lotus Bloom and the Afro Revolution

Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 2022

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapters 1-4

Chapters 5-11

Chapters 12-17

Chapters 18-22

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Tools

Beta

Discussion Questions

Symbols & Motifs

Music

Content Warning: This section of the guide features depictions of bullying, racism, and anti-gay bias.

One important motif throughout the novel is music. Music is a key component of Lotus’s identity that she uses to cope with difficult situations and express how she feels. Sherri Winston uses figurative language throughout the text to convey how important music is to Lotus. For example, Lotus thinks how her grandmother is “a birdlike woman who reminds [Lotus] of the musical score from an old, old movie composed by Bernard Hermann called North by Northwest,” with the “highs and lows and drama and range” (44). This metaphor, comparing Granny to this musical score, conveys the difficult relationship that they have, full of “highs and lows” that involve fights between Granny and Lotus’s mother. However, through it all, she emphasizes that she “can’t stop loving” either the score or her grandmother (44). Similar metaphors and similes are found throughout the novel, emphasizing the way that Lotus feels in her comparisons to music.

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Music conveys two important themes in the novel: Music in Personal and Political Expression and Finding One’s Voice in the Fight Against Prejudice. At the board meeting, Lotus relies on music to make her political statement, expressing her disgust at the community for their fighting and emphasizing their need to work together to build a better community for all. Additionally, when Lotus finally decides that she is going to make a stand, she plays her violin: “I lock myself in my room with my violin and Mozart. Just me and Wolfie. I play his Concerto no. 5. I shut my eyes and fold myself between the notes. My bow slices swiftly, capturing the emotion, the joy, the energy” (209-10). In this way, music is more than just sound for Lotus, serving as a physical embodiment of how she feels, giving her both an escape and strength. After she plays, she decides, “It’s time to make a choice. It’s time to take a stand” (210). In this way, music helps Lotus find her voice and decide that it is time to stand up for herself and her community.

Lotus’s Afro

Lotus’s afro is a symbol of her pride. She spends time each morning making sure that it is perfect and considers it an important part of her identity. When the people she meets at Atlantis—like Dion and Tati—compliment it, she immediately befriends them, as they understand her style and the value that her afro holds for her. As a traditional symbol of Black identity, her afro is an important part of her skin color, heritage, and identity. The importance of her hair is emphasized when she is forced to change by Mr. Mackie and Mrs. Cortez. She initially tries to change it but is overwhelmed by the way that it makes her feel insecure and how she stands out less with her new hairstyle. The school dress code policy—which Mr. Mackie uses to try to make Lotus change—highlights the institutionalized racism of the school. As Lotus explains, the school policy “does not take into account that Black girls have Black girl hair” (173). While the school board tries to co-opt her hair and use it as a weapon against her, the pride and the passion she feels is what ultimately allows her to change and stand up for herself. In this way, Lotus’s afro is a key component of the theme of Finding One’s Voice in the Fight Against Prejudice. The school’s effort to control Lotus’s afro—and thus her pride and identity as a Black girl—facilitates Lotus’s change in the novel, as she grows and understands the importance of resisting injustice in response.

Paris

At the beginning of the novel, the city of Paris is a symbolic representation of Lotus’s dreams and ambitions for her music career. Because her father lives in Paris as a professional musician, Lotus becomes fixated on moving to Paris and living with him to pursue her own career. She secretly requests more information from the Académie, a prestigious music school, and forges her parents’ signatures while hiding the information from her parents.

However, one change that Lotus undergoes in the novel is her new understanding of the importance of things in life other than music. After she speaks with her father on the phone and he asks her to compromise with the district regarding the school, she begins to be disenchanted by the idea of Paris and leaving home to live with her father. She thinks how, “Mom is here. She makes sure I eat every day. She’s the one who spoons leftover stew into a covered dish and sneaks it into my room. She’s the one helping me detangle and maintain my hair, even though she wishes I would straighten it” (153). These thoughts convey Lotus’s developing understanding of adulthood and her future. While she may idolize the life that her father lives, she also begins to realize that he has given up his responsibilities as a father and chosen to go off to pursue music, leaving her mother to be her sole caretaker. This change in Lotus also changes her opinion of Paris. As a result, by the end of the novel, it no longer symbolizes the entirety of her hopes and dreams but instead represents just one component of her future. While she still wants to travel to Paris and participate in the International Youth Orchestra, she is no longer fixated on leaving her life to go Paris. She now has a better understanding of the many components of life, instead of focusing solely on her music.