55 pages • 1 hour read
Paolo BacigalupiThe Windup Girl
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2009A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
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BetaChapters 40-42Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 40 Summary
Hock Seng finds himself in the middle of the escalating conflict as a tank appears and wreaks destruction. Megadonts slash through the crowds, killing people. The fleeing and fearful surround Hock Seng and he is buried beneath bodies. His knee is crushed but he manages to extricate himself from the carnage. He takes a bicycle owned by an injured man. Despite his injury, Hock rides off.
Chapter 41 Summary
Akkarat, Anderson, and Carlyle watch the conflagration. Akkarat assures Anderson that AgriGen still remains a favored company as the stockpiles of green methane belonging to the Environment Ministry explode and the city burns.
Chapter 42 Summary
Hock Seng reaches the factory and is reunited with Mai, who has fled her burning village. She helps Hock corrode the safe with a dangerous kind of bacteria that acts like an acid. Dog Fucker and the Dung Lord’s men arrive, and a tense exchange occurs. Mai and Hock flee; as they run down the streets, a flyer featuring Emiko and her crimes blows through the air. Hock tells Mai he has another idea.
Chapters 40-42 Analysis
These short, clipped chapters accurately show how the destruction occurs in troubling, brief moments. The burning of methane gas also punctuates the heat of global warming, which has wrecked the environment, and accentuates the heated body of Emiko, who, as a non-military windup, has helped to incite this revolution through her murder of the Somdet Chaopraya.
Mai functions as a kind of double for Hiroko; she is obedient, useful, loyal but very much human. She influences Hock, helps him as much as she can, and tries to save him. In many ways, the unnatural and geisha-like qualities of the Japanese Hiroko and Emiko become fully fleshed out in the courage and persistence of Mai. Hock refers to her as clever when she figures out the best way to open the safe.
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By Paolo Bacigalupi
