“The Sun Is Also A Star” by Nicola Yoon connects many strangers’ lives intricately. Though it follows the experiences of its primary characters, Natasha Kingsley and Daniel Bae, it stretches out and shows the people who influenced Daniel and Natasha’s lives. Every character had an intricate story that determined the outcome of their lives, and the novel showed how their past affected the present and future.
Natasha Kingsley
Role: Natasha is the primary female protagonist.
Key Info: Natasha Kingsley is a seventeen-year-old Jamaican girl and an undocumented immigrant.
Determined to fight the deportation order, Natasha heads to the USCIS office. She meets a young female security guard named Irene, and after pleading with her, Natasha meets Lester Barnes, who refers her to an immigration attorney, Jeremy Fitzgerald.
On her way to Attorney Jeremy’s office, Natasha enters a music store and sees her ex-boyfriend, Rob, who cheated on her with the girl he was currently kissing. Sickened by the scene, she remarks, and a strange boy in a suit and red tie responds, saying the kissing couple may likely be shoplifters.
After a brief moment together, Natasha leaves the boy and heads out. She attempts to cross the road but falls back. Natasha realizes the red-tie boy saved her life, and he introduces himself as Daniel. She then agrees to go on a date with him.
Daniel Bae
Role: Daniel Jae Ho Bae is the primary male protagonist.
Key Info: He is a seventeen-year-old second-generation Korean-American and a poetry lover.
Daniel offers to fix Natasha’s headphones, but she refuses. He then asks her on a small date, and she agrees after he persuades her. Daniel takes Natasha on a coffee date and learns more about her. He discovers she is a cynic who believes in the rigidity of the universe.
As Daniel talks with Natasha, he finds himself falling for her. He reveals he is to attend an admission interview for Yale University. While talking, Natasha tells Daniel not to fall in love with her. However, he asks her for a day.
Daniel escorts Natasha to her appointment and secretly waits for her. He takes her to his family’s salon, where he fights with his brother. On leaving, he and Natasha head to a Korean restaurant, then karaoke, where Natasha passionately kisses him.
Upon realizing they have fallen for each other, Natasha tells Daniel she is an illegal immigrant who is to leave the country the same day.
Shocked by the revelation, Daniel fights with Natasha and leaves. He returns to his family’s salon and fights his brother.
Daniel heads to his interview and realizes he and Natasha had an appointment with the same person, Attorney Jeremy Fitzgerald. He and Jeremy discuss, and Daniel learns of Natasha’s deportation verdict.
Attorney Jeremy Fitzgerald
Role: Attorney Jeremy Fitzgerald is a lawyer who takes on Natasha’s immigration case.
Key Info: Attorney Jeremy is the best immigration lawyer in New York City.
On returning to the office, Jeremy meets Natasha Kingsley, a seventeen-year-old girl fighting a deportation order issued to her family. After hearing her story, he agrees to fight for her. However, he misses the appointment with the judge presiding over Natasha’s case.
On returning to the office, Hannah talks to a boy and says she is leaving. When the boy enters, he is shocked and tells Jeremy he knows Natasha. Noticing the bruise on his face and blood on his shirt, Jeremy asks the young boy about his interest in Yale. However, the boy says he does not want to attend the university and tells him he wants to be a poet.
Jeremy eventually reveals to the boy he failed to help Natasha. He later leaves his wife and marries Hannah.
Charlie Bae
Role: Charles Jae Won Bae is Daniel’s older brother.
Key Info: He is a student at Harvard University, but after struggling academically, he withdraws for two semesters, bringing his parents shame.
Charlie eventually returns to school and graduates. He becomes a corrupt politician and drops his Korean name.
Samuel Kingsley
Role: Samuel Kingsley is Natasha’s father.
Key Info: As a lover of acting, Samuel leaves his wife and daughter and heads to America to fulfill his dreams.
Unable to make it big, Samuel turns to menial jobs to make ends meet. However, after getting an acting gig, he and his friends drink into a stupor, and the police apprehend him. They discover Samuel is an illegal immigrant and order him and his family to leave the country. After returning home, Samuel realizes he has chosen right. He becomes an actor in a local community theater.
Patricia Kingsley
Role: Patricia Kingsley is Samuel Kingsley’s wife and Natasha’s mother.
Key Info: She entered the United States illegally with her daughter to meet her husband.
After Patricia passes away, life becomes hard for Natasha, Peter, and Samuel. However, her love for her family holds them together. Eventually, Natasha meets Daniel five years later.
Dae Hyun Bae
Role: Dae Hyun is Daniel and Charlie’s father.
Key Info: He emigrated from South Korea with his wife after discovering that keeping his family’s crab fishing business would leave him in poverty.
As a reserved man, Dae believed that poverty is contagious; this made him never talk about his past with his sons.
After Daniel’s fight with Charlie, Dae says he wants him to attend Yale to have a prestigious life free of poverty. He tells Daniel he will cut him off if he does not attend the university.
Min Soo Bae
Role: Min Soo Bae is Daniel and Charlie’s mother.
Key Info: Her youngest son, Daniel, loves her and feels comfortable writing poetry in her presence.
When Min Soo learns Charlie is advised to forfeit two semesters at Harvard, she is distraught and tells Daniel to avoid being like his brother; this angers Charlie.
Lester Barnes
Role: Lester Barnes is the case officer at the USCIS building in Manhattan.
Key Info: He meets a young girl whose family is facing deportation.
“The Sun Is Also A Star” beautifully portrays how the tiniest actions have significant consequences. If Lester had never helped Natasha, then Irene would have died, and Daniel would have lived an unfulfilling life as he would not have met Natasha.
Irene
Role: Irene is a depressed security guard at the USCIS building.
Key Info: She suffers from extreme loneliness and looks like a non-challant person to others.
With a new conviction, Irene quits her job and becomes a flight attendant. Ten years later, she meets the same woman whose message changed her life, and unknowingly, her interactions unite the woman with the love of her life.
The White BMW Driver
Role: The white BMW driver is a man named Donald Christainsen.
Key Info: Donald Christainsen is a man suffering from the grief of his daughter’s demise.
“The Sun Is Also A Star” excellently quantified its characters’ emotions. Donald Christen was lost in grief and could see no way out as his daughter’s death was a stain that would never wash away. Nicola intricately humanized his feelings and gave him a well-deserved redemption.
Other Characters in the novel include Peter Kingsley, Bev, Rob, Hannah Winter, and The Conductor.