The House of the Scorpion
Written by Nancy Farmer, flyer by Lucas Hurla.
Music that goes well with the book's mood.
Beethoven Sonata No. 23 in F minor Op. 57 Appassionata Movement 2 Performed by Samuel Puan by Samuel Puan
Important Characters
- Matt is the protagonist of The House of the Scorpion. He is one of many clones of El Patrón. When El Patrón dies, Matt becomes the leader of Opium.
- El Patrón was a drug lord and the ruler of Opium. He uses his power to create clones of himself so he can use them for their healthy organs. He suffers from a heart attack and tries to take Matt's healthy heart, but does not succeed and has another heart attack, leaving him dead as a dumb deer.
- Celia is Matt's maternal figure, and does a good job of raising him.
An Opium plant, of which many are grown in the land of Opium.
Plot Elements
El Patrón is the ruler of Opium, a large opium producing between Mexico and America. He makes clones of himself in order to harvest their organs when he needs to, allowing him to live for over 140 years.
Matt is one of El Patrón's clones who lives in a small house with Celia. He winds up needing to be taken to the big mansion of El Patrón. There he is locked in a room and treated horribly because somebody recognized that he was a clone. El Patrón discovers the poor treatment of Matt and frees him, after which he gives him a room in the mansion.
At some point in his seven year residence at El Patrón's mansion, Matt finds out that he is a clone and what his purpose is; a source of body parts for El Patrón. He is very distraught by this, but convinces himself El Patrón didn't plan on using him as he had his other clones.
El Patrón has a heart attack, and when Matt talks to him at the hospital, El Patrón tells him that he was created solely for organ harvesting. Right then, Celia tells El Patrón that she had been building Matt's tolerance to poison up, and that the amounts he had endured could kill him. This makes El Patrón so angry that he has another heart attack, killing him this time and saving Matt.
Matt travels to a different land, where he finds a gang of orphans who are essentially slaves for a group called "The Keepers". Matt leads a rebellion against The Keepers. He eventually makes his way back to Opium, where he learns that all of El Patrón's posse had been poisoned at his funeral, and died, leaving Matt as the leader.