35 pages • 1-hour read
Stargazing
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Chapters 3-4Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 3 Summary
Christine’s father drives the girls (including Moon) to school. It is Moon’s first day at Fairmont Elementary and her eyes are wide with curiosity and excitement. Moon instantly falls for her teacher, Mr. Pennypacker, and amalgamates into Christine’s friend group quickly after she dismisses the rumors about her being violent. Moon and Christine sign up to do a dance performance at the talent show and eat lunch with Christine’s friends.
After school, Christine’s mother invites Moon to her Chinese lesson with some of the local kids and her daughters. Moon is hesitant because she doesn’t know Chinese, but Christine’s mother thinks it’s a great opportunity to learn. When asked to recite a poem about a lonely man longing for home, Moon struggles through it and leaves, embarrassed. She makes faces at Christine through the windows. Afterward, the girls hang out and Moon shows Christine her drawings of Mr. Pennypacker, revealing Moon’s crush. She encourages Christine to paint her toenails even though Christine’s parents would disapprove. When Christine goes to bed that night, she admires her pink toenails with pride.
Chapter 4 Summary
Christine and Moon’s class takes a field trip to the local planetarium. There, they see a tesla coil and Moon stares at it, totally mesmerized. Christine looks at her strangely, wondering what has suddenly gotten into Moon. During the star show, Moon tells Christine that her home is in the stars, and Christine doesn’t know what to say. That night, Moon comes over to watch the basketball game, and Christine’s dad joins them. Christine’s mother comes home during the height of the excitement.
Suddenly, Vivian breaks down in tears. She says that she was called stupid by a peer during math class and is now worried about growing up to have no home like Moon. Mrs. Hong tries to assure Vivian that she will always have the support of her family, but nothing seems to calm her down. Christine and Moon stare at one another in shock as they watch their favorite player talk about his victory.
Chapters 3-4 Analysis
As Moon and Christine’s worlds intersect, they both experience changes in their lives and personalities. Each of them brings out the best in one another and they quickly become close friends.
Moon, is always illustrated with bright, widened eyes, revealing her deep sense of wonder for the world around her. She seems to embrace life with ease and excitement. Christine, in turn, is becoming more confident, such as when signing up for the talent show. Wang continues to explore how they are foils.
Christine finds studying and learning easy, while Moon finds socializing easy. They help each other become more comfortable in the areas they lack.
Though Moon feels secure at school, she feels out of place and embarrassed when attending Christine’s mother’s Chinese lesson. Her confidence, it seems, is easily broken when a vulnerability is revealed. She feels self-conscious reading the poem about the lonely man longing for home because like him, she is lonely and longs for a place where she belongs. Christine’s mother also shames Moon about Mrs. Lin not communicating with her in Chinese.
Wang introduces Moon’s visions. Initially, they are shown as drawings in Moon’s sketchbook—colorful, loose renderings of mystical-looking people. Moon sees them as real, indicated by her comment: “They’re my friends” (72). At the planetarium, she looks up at the fake stars and points to them with a fondness that is genuine. Christine does not judge Moon, showing her openness and empathy. She compliments the beauty of the drawings and listens quietly as Moon explains them. Both Christine and Moon feel lonely in their worlds. Moon’s visions help her cope, while Christine is comforted by Moon’s easygoing personality.
In her work, Wang includes few splash pages, where a lone panel or image comprises the entire page. When one appears, the reader can be assured it is significant. While Moon and Christine sit in the darkened planetarium and stare up at the rendered sky, it is as though their entire world is immersed in space and the thought of elsewhere. Moon, like Wang, is an illustrator, relating to how Wang loosely based Moon on herself as a child.
At the end of Chapter 4, tension is introduced by Vivian’s outburst about not wanting to lose her home like Moon. This heightens Moon’s sense of feeling different, and Moon sees it as an attack on her family and character. Moon tries hard to fit in. When attention is called to her being different, she lashes out, as she will when hurting the boy who called Vivian stupid and promoted her outburst.
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