Overcoming challenges in their relationships helps the main characters in each text, A Friend like Henry and The China coin, to mature and grow as people. Within both novels there are signs of a faulty relationship between the main characters. Circumstances and challenges that occur within the texts allow these broken relationships to improve and even mend. The main characters begin to form a better understanding of each other and through communication learn how to get along with each other.
The China Coin delves into the fractured relationship between a mother and her daughter, exploring how this relationship starts to mature in her perspectives and understanding. At the beginning of the novel, the main characters, Joan and Leah, relationship …show more content…
Upon hearing this conversation Leah begins to mature in her thoughts and becomes to realise how distant she has become from her mother. Leah also recognises the challenges that her mother has faced, losing both parents within a short period and then her husband and how her mother was grieving the loss of her family. Leah realises how selfish and unfair she has been towards her mother and that searching for the other half of the coin represented finding family and how important this was for her mother.
By the end of the book Leah has many experiences within a short period that helps her character to develop and mature. Experiencing Tiananmen Square, a near shooting in the street and bunkering down in the Australian Embassy for protection all help Leah to mature and realise how lucky she is to have a loving mother and to live in a country that is free.
In A Friend like Henry, the relationship between the main characters, Dale and his mother Nuala, is a complicated one, as Dale has severe autism. At the beginning of the text, Dale is unable to communicate properly with his mother and this in turn makes Dale quite frustrated and violent towards his mother, such as at Eiger park, where his mother had to develop a way of walking up the stairs with “Dale fighting against [Nuala] …show more content…
Swallow is the first friend she makes when she arrives in China. One of Leah’s biggest challenges is that she is a very negative person and it is Swallow that helps her to overcome this negativity. Swallow teaches Leah that it is alright to have fun and together they explore the village, go “[shock] fishing” and chase the attacking ducks. This relationship helps Leah to relax from her usual serious self and assists her to grow by teaching her how to have some fun. This relationship is like a “sisterly” relationship, something Leah has never