How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #7
And he thought, Was there really information lodged within him that he didn't know about? (25.15)
Shmoop thinks so. Adam's memories tend to come up when they're associated with something else. Brint seems to be able to draw out certain images from Adam's brain by nudging him in a particular direction. Who's to say that if his father were there, reminding him of the day he discovered the truth, Adam wouldn't remember more about that, too?
Quote #8
The worst part is that my memories arrive piecemeal, in bits and pieces, the entire picture isn't clear. (25.16)
Adam describes his memories in words, in his conversations with Brint, and we read them as words on the page. But the memories arriving in bits and pieces for Adam are images, right? And sensations? We don't generally remember our experiences in words, but Adam is forced to convey them that way. Would Brint have obtained better information if he had asked Adam to draw his memories?
Quote #9
It's still incomplete. The blanks are still there. In fact, sometimes I'm a blank. I find myself here talking to you and don't remember where I came from, whether from my room in this place or someplace else altogether. And sometimes it seems we have been through this all before, that the questions are the same questions I've heard a thousand times before. (28.1)
Only at the end of the book do we find out that Adam's hunch was right – he had been asked these questions before. Cormier is using very subtle foreshadowing here, but because we can't trust Adam's memory, it's not an obvious indication of what's to come.