60 pages • 2 hours read
Steve HamiltonThe Lock Artist
Steve HamiltonFiction | 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.
Chapter 1Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 1 Summary: “Locked Up Tight for Another Day”
Chapter 1 frames the dual, parallel narratives that follow. The narrator introduces himself in the first person with the opening line, “You may remember me” (1). He does not reveal his name, Mike (or, later, Michael), until the last sentence of the chapter. He references his unusual celebrity, vaguely alluding to a horrific trauma that he survived in June of 1990, when he was a young boy in Michigan. He notes that newspapers nicknamed him “Miracle Boy” (1). The reader discovers that Mike is writing this account from prison, where for the past nine years he has been “locked up”—an echo of the novel’s title and Mike’s former criminal vocation as a lock picker.
Mike has not “spoken one single word out loud” (2) since his childhood trauma occurred. Since he cannot speak, he has decided to write the memoir that follows—a recollection of his childhood since the trauma and the events leading to his incarceration. He says he is not ready to recount the traumatic event itself, since it is too painful, and he “can’t go there yet” (3). That incident wounded him so profoundly that “Some days it’s all I can do to keep breathing” (3). Instead of narrating chronologically, he says, “I’ll kind of skip around” (2).
In practice, the narrative that follows does not “skip around” so much as it alternates from chapter to chapter between two plot lines told chronologically: One narrative recounts his childhood and teenage years leading up to the beginning of his criminal career; the other recounts that short criminal career, leading up to his incarceration.
Chapter 1 Analysis
Chapter 1 is the most structurally significant chapter of the book, as it introduces the protagonist, sets the emotional tone, situates the plot, and frames the dual parallel narratives that make up the body of the novel. Mike introduces himself—though not by name until the last sentence of the chapter—as the first-person narrator. A number of the traits that make him unreliable as a narrator are immediately on display: He shows himself to be cynical, misanthropic, and self-mythologizing, characteristics that should all inspire skepticism in the reader. Mike’s tone is informal, intimate, and direct: He addresses the reader in second-person narration, saying, “it can be like we’re sitting together at a bar somewhere, just you and me, having a long talk” (2). This slangy style will persist throughout the novel, with only a few dramatic passages exhibiting a more florid style.
Mike’s statement, “I’ll kind of skip around, if you don’t mind” (2), is somewhat misleading: The following memoirs are not out of chronological sequence, but rather alternate between two parallel, chronological plot lines. Throughout the novel, Mike often makes promises about revelations to come, but he does not always follow through in that regard. His intentionally crude style occasionally verges on petulance, particularly when he claims to be misunderstood by others or jumps to the conclusion that others’ supportive gestures are selfishly motivated. He perpetuates the mythology surrounding his muteness and his special skills, a habit that suggests he may be narcissistic.
Because of the alternating narratives in the body of the novel, the analyses in this section will group even chapters (2, 4, 6, etc.) and odd chapters (3, 5, 7, etc.), tracking character development chronologically within those plot lines.
Unlock all 60 pages of this Study GuidePlus, gain access to 8,800+ more expert-written Study Guides.
Including features: