55 pages • 1-hour read
Paper Girl: A Memoir of Home and Family in a Fractured America
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Part 2Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of death by suicide, child sexual abuse, mental illness, emotional abuse, gender discrimination, illness, antigay bias, death, graphic violence, racism, pregnancy termination, addiction, and child death.
Part 2: “Silos”
Part 2, Chapter 6 Summary: “Homecoming”
In the fall of 2023, Silas re-enrolls at Clark State as a fully licensed driver, working full-time at McDonald’s while attending classes. After a summer breakup with his girlfriend, he is thrilled that his mother has permission for unsupervised visits with his youngest half-siblings, ages three and four, who remain in foster care. Silas finds engineering courses dry but earns straight A’s and excels at hands-on welding. He dyes his hair maroon for Urbana High School (UHS) homecoming and helps his mentor, band director Mr. Sapp, coach Silas’s successor as drum major, Mikey Dale.
When the PT Cruiser breaks down, Silas’s parents fix it without complaint. His college mentor, Toni Overholser, a Clark State staff member, is worried, as transportation barriers explain why 40% of community college students drop out. Silas shows a natural aptitude for welding, and jobs in the field start at $49,000, with certification bringing a $1,600 bonus; he can likely resolve his transportation problems if he manages to make it through training. However, Macy discovers that profound trauma is common among exemplary poor students she interviews, a pattern her former teacher, Cassie Cress, confirms. At homecoming, Silas kisses his new boyfriend, Arlo, an art student from Columbus whom he met online, but the festivities mask deeper problems: chronic absenteeism and recent deaths by suicide.
Macy’s friend, Karla, lost friends who feared catching COVID from her vaccination. Political scientist Lilliana Mason tells Macy that political dehumanization often precedes violence. In this environment, rural sociologist Kathy Cramer advises meeting her sister with curiosity rather than politics. Macy cites philosopher Richard Rorty’s 1998 prediction that class resentment would result in the election of a strongman. Local Democrats struggle to recruit candidates in the hostile environment.
For Macy, preparing to interview her sister Cookie is scarier than any previous assignment. However, Cookie, who is now 72 and uses a walker, is surprisingly open during their longest conversation in decades. They reminisce about childhood and actor Woody Harrelson’s summer in Urbana, when he attended one of Cookie’s Bible studies wearing very short shorts. The conversation covers their divergent paths and Cookie’s fundamentalist church. Macy describes how the 1980s brought the end of the FCC’s fairness doctrine, the rise of right-wing media figures, and culture wars that pitted her journalistic values against Cookie’s religious conservatism and widened their rift.
Part 2, Chapter 7 Summary: “Strangers”
In the 1990s, Macy and her husband joined a progressive church that Cookie called a cult. Macy contrasts her inclusive congregation with Cookie’s patriarchal one. In 1984, at 20, Macy terminated a pregnancy, kept it secret from her mother, and revealed it only recently to her husband. She reflects that her children would not exist without that choice, which proved vital to her social mobility.
In 1988, abuse allegations against Cookie’s third husband surfaced when 11-year-old Liza reported sexual assault to a school counselor. Cookie’s daughters were placed with their biological father. Macy wrote to officials urging an investigation, but the prosecutor, Joseph Palmer, refused to pursue the case while focusing instead on an anti-pornography decency panel. No charges were ever filed. The shame was profound, triggering panic attacks in Macy that required therapy.
On Christmas Eve 1991, Macy and her husband found Cookie’s youngest daughter after she ran away; the couple took her to their in-laws’ for the holiday. The nieces were eventually sent to a children’s home. Psychologist Diana Zuckerman comments that being disbelieved by a parent after abuse constitutes being abandoned twice.
During the interview, Cookie denies that the abuse could have occurred and asks if Liza truly believes it happened. Despite this, Cookie expresses pride in Liza’s professional success managing a large team at an international company. Liza was closer to her grandmother (Macy’s mother) than to Cookie and has a tattoo of Sarah’s signature. Macy used her inheritance to take Liza to Europe, where Liza found the culture safer and her stress-related eczema cleared up.
Cookie reveals her isolation under her controlling husband, who fears COVID and prevents her from attending church. She shrugs when asked if she loves him and says that she wishes one of them would die. As Macy leaves, she mentions her son, Max, who is gay; Cookie responds that she loves him but not his orientation, quoting Leviticus, which uses the word “abomination” for it. Macy shuts down the topic and says that she will not invite Cookie to the wedding. Cookie says that she would not attend.
Later, Macy tells Silas about the conversation. Silas, who now works third shift at a car-parts factory with his parents, shares that his mother used to be prejudiced against LGBTQ+ people but came to accept him, believing God gave her Silas to teach her that being gay or trans is not a choice. He recalls his eighth-grade principal allowing him to wear a suit to his promotion ceremony, evidence of some progress in the conservative town.
Part 2, Chapter 8 Summary: “Tribalism”
Urbana’s town square projects vibrancy with new coffee shops and businesses, but decay lurks nearby: profane signs, security cameras on working-class blocks, and widespread economic anxiety. Macy’s childhood home is now the nicest on the street, though the wary owner initially refuses Macy entry. A statewide open-enrollment policy allows Urbana parents to send children to the higher-performing West Liberty district, even after a 2017 school shooting there. Urbana’s police chief cannot secure funding for a second school resource officer, and violent crimes have tripled since 1984.
Macy credits her second-grade teacher, Pam Bullard Mack, Urbana High’s first Black cheerleader, with shaping her sense of justice. Pam recalls facing segregation in restaurants and her father making her register as a Republican for protection. Fifty years later, she and Macy reconnect and remember the day Pam taught the class about the “N-word” after a student used it. Pam is alarmed by the recent proliferation of Confederate flags, which she blames on Donald Trump. Their mutual friend Celesta Dunn, a retired university executive assistant, recounts being subjected to a racist verbal assault and says that she has lost 20 friends over political disagreements.
The old library now houses the Urbana Youth Center, run by Justin Weller, who narrowly lost the 2019 mayoral election. In 2023, the center lost a $2.25 million state grant after city leaders refused to provide letters of support. Retired teacher Lance Jackson describes the disappearance of the middle class in Urbana schools after NAFTA and identifies a 2010 policy change making homework optional as a tipping point. The Jacksons are considering moving to Oberlin to escape anti-gay sentiment, as Lance cannot discuss his daughter’s life with old friends because she is gay.
At an anti-abortion rally, County Commissioner Nino Vitale claims, incorrectly, that the abortion-rights amendment would gut parental rights and lead to the sale of fetal body parts. The amendment, Issue 1, passes statewide but is defeated in Champaign County. Political scientist Steven Conn attributes Ohio Republican extremism to Christian nationalist influence and gerrymandering.
Macy has dinner with her childhood friend Joy, a conservative Christian who repeats misinformation about abortion and George Floyd. Joy asks how to love despite disagreement, a question neither can fully answer.
Part 2, Chapter 9 Summary: “Red-Pilled”
Macy reconnects with Dave Curnutte, a high school friend and retired firefighter from a poor background. Curnutte, a reunion organizer, fell out with classmate Mark Evans, who is biracial, over pro-Trump memes Evans considered racist. Many classmates skipped the 40th reunion due to infighting. Amy Puglia Hunter, married to well-known Black basketball coach Ron Hunter, recounts the racism they have faced and her pain over old friends’ support for Trump. She has cut off classmates who spread pedophilia conspiracies about Democrats.
Macy interviews Terri Thompson, a reunion organizer and avowed QAnon believer who expresses belief in various conspiracies, including that Joe Biden is dead and has been replaced by an actor. A national survey indicates that 16% of Americans are QAnon devotees. Terri explains the concept of being “red-pilled” and names nine other schoolmates in her group. The only reliable local news Macy finds is the Ohio Capital Journal, an online nonprofit, though no one in Urbana has heard of it. Addiction expert Dr. Bruce Alexander calls right-wing conspiracies the most harmful addiction.
Macy meets her ex-boyfriend, Bill, for the first time in 38 years. Bill, now single after his ex-wife’s death, spends hours daily watching news on YouTube and expresses extreme hatred of Hillary Clinton. He dismisses mainstream newspapers as propaganda, having lost trust after the Iraq War. He is uninsured, angry about Obamacare, and unable to drive at night due to untreated cataracts. He became an independent after the Monica Lewinsky scandal, voted for Jill Stein in 2016, and was subsequently ostracized by friends and his church. Their relationship becomes tense when Bill accuses Macy of trying to interview his children.
Local developer Terry Howell gets his news from right-wing sources and believes conspiracy theories about the January 6 insurrection based on what friends told him. These men are deeply engaged, rural voters, susceptible to conspiracies yet know little about local social problems.
Meanwhile, Silas is on his third job and fourth car of the school year. He was fired from the factory for leaving sick without permission and now works at Walmart. His mother has regained custody of his siblings, and his new boyfriend, Max Spencer, has moved in. Poverty scholars Sendhil Mullainathan and Eldar Shafir describe the constant chaos in Silas’s life as a bandwidth tax. Silas expresses a desire for a more stable life.
Part 2 Analysis
Juxtaposition remains a key literary device in these chapters, and not merely through Macy’s use of contrasting stories. Rather, this section contrasts the surface appearance of communal life with the underlying reality of social decay and fragmentation. The homecoming festivities in Chapter 6 serve as a key example. The event projects an image of unity and tradition, but beneath this veneer lies a town grappling with chronic student absenteeism, recent teen deaths by suicide, and deep-seated political divisions. Similarly, Urbana’s revitalized town square, with its new coffee shops and businesses, presents an appearance of economic vibrancy that conceals profane signs, ubiquitous security cameras, and palpable economic anxiety on nearby streets. This contrast between appearance and reality suggests that visible signs of progress may be cosmetic, masking systemic issues that many residents and local leaders do not address. The technique critiques a tendency to prioritize the aesthetics of community over the work of addressing foundational crises.
Macy dives deeper into how the collapse of a shared information ecosystem has created what rural sociologist Kathy Cramer terms a “bifurcated communications environment” (111). The decline of local newspapers creates a vacuum filled by partisan national media and online conspiracy theories, effectively sorting residents into separate realities, as evidenced by data like the statistic that 16% of Americans are QAnon devotees. This media consumption provides them not only with information but also with an identity and a community built on shared grievances. Conversely, a fact-based, non-profit news source, the Ohio Capital Journal, exists to cover state politics, yet no one Macy interviews has heard of it. This dichotomy exemplifies The Collapse of Local Journalism and Civic Trust, as residents are sorted into incompatible information worlds.
Macy grounds this phenomenon with personal anecdotes, discussing how her sister, Cookie, consumes news from Fox News and the Christian Broadcasting Network; her ex-boyfriend, Bill, watches right-wing YouTube channels; and her classmate, Terri Thompson, is immersed in QAnon. This focus on Macy’s relationships creates pathos that operates on two levels. Most overtly, it reveals the human impact of hyperpartisan politics and misinformation, showing how these forces tear apart friends and families. It also implicitly works to counteract this trend. Macy’s presumed readership is educated, liberal, and urban—the opposite of the people she profiles. Her portraits of people like Bill, whose politics blend “right-wing” and “left-wing” positions (e.g., distrust of the Affordable Care Act coupled with suspicion of US military action abroad), humanize individuals her readers might be inclined to stereotype. The book itself thus seeks to bridge partisan, geographical, and class divides through empathy and conversation.
Parallel to its consideration of communal decay, the narrative explores the psychological toll of unprocessed trauma as an element driving both individual and collective dysfunction. One example is the unaddressed sexual abuse of the author’s niece, Liza. The family’s inability to confront this event, compounded by the justice system’s failure to act, precipitated the author’s panic attacks and led her sister Cookie into a state of denial that has damaged her relationships. Macy suggests that, for Cookie, rejecting her daughter’s reality is a psychological defense mechanism that allows her to maintain her marriage and religious worldview at the cost of family cohesion. This dynamic of trauma and denial is mirrored in Silas’s life, where the chaos stemming from poverty and family instability imposes what scholars call a “bandwidth tax,” a cognitive burden that makes stability feel out of reach. By intertwining these personal histories with the broader social narrative, the text argues that the political and economic crises in towns like Urbana are inseparable from the psychological wounds of their citizens, developing the theme of Trauma and the Politics of Despair.
Against this backdrop of social and psychological fracture, Macy employs foils to explore a spectrum of human responses, from ideological entrenchment to empathy and growth. A key contrast is between the author’s sister Cookie and Silas’s mother. When confronted with a gay family member, Cookie retreats into scripture, quoting Leviticus. In contrast, Silas’s mother, once anti-LGBTQ+, changes her perspective through her relationship with her son, coming to believe God gave her Silas to show her that being gay “[i]s not a choice” (140). Her evolution demonstrates a capacity for change rooted in direct experience. A similar foil exists between two high school classmates: Amy Puglia Hunter challenges the racism and conspiracy theories of her peers, while Terri Thompson embraces the QAnon narrative. These juxtapositions suggest that while social and economic forces shape people’s lives, individual agency and the willingness to question one’s worldview remain critical. The divergent paths of these figures illustrate a central conflict between ideological conformity and interpersonal connection.
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