A Life Without Consequences

A Life Without Consequences is a semi-biographical novel from emerging author Stephen Elliott. His novel traces the fate of Paul, a boy whose mother has died and who runs away from a violent father. The book follows Paul from living on the streets of Chicago to passing through juvenile institutions and a state system that is primarily programmed for failure. There, he meets Tanya and they fall in love but they are young and are separated after a failed attempt to escape the institution. Paul battles through the violent system all the while battling his own rapidly budding adolescence. But as he turns sixteen he starts to come to terms with his own path, not as an adult, but as a scared child and we see that Paul’s emotions that we think of as anger are actually the determination to take control of his future. While the characters are fictional, they are representative of many and we realize the fragility of childhood and the burden on the children who have nowhere else to go.