Pyromania
Pyromania is when a person deliberately starts fires to relieve tensions and afterward it grants gratification to the person starting the fire. In the novel My Sister’s Keeper pyromania is present during the whole book and endangers many lives. In Jodi Picoult novel, My Sister’s Keeper, it is evident that pyromania is a destructive illness and affects Jess’s life greatly.
“I am the kid who played with matches. I used to steal them from the shelf above the refrigerator, take them into my parents’ bathroom. Jean Nate bath splash ignites, strike and you can set fire to the floor.” That’s what Jesse said when he introduced himself to the novel. After burning all of the bath splash Jesse decides to go 95 mph down the highway. Pyromania effects people in other ways too, like how Jesse just doesn’t care how fast he goes, he’s reckless.
Jesse soon moves on from making little fires in the bathroom to a storage facility. Jesse gets sawdust and acid from his friend Dan to burn down the facility. “My Zippo’s almost out of lighter fluid; I need to remember to get some. When I’m finished, I get to my feet, take one last drag, and toss the cigarette into the sawdust.” Jesse is a smart arsonist because he thinks things through so he won’t get caught starting fires and burning things. “Psychosocial hypotheses suggest pyromania may be a form of communication from those with few social skills.” That fact is shown how Jesse is lonely and his only friend is Dan.
“How cool would it be if I just backed up the truck up to a window, dumped in several bottles of my Arsonist’s Special, and drove away with the place bursting into flames?” Jesse goes and steels a dump truck from a construction zone and tells Dan about making a place burst into flames. Jesse also says “there are some nights when you just want to know there’s someone else besides you in this wide world.” A symptom of pyromania is “pyromaniacs are known to have feelings of sadness and loneliness,” which is...