The heart of the story is that a little bit of kindness toward Carrie could have literally changed her whole life,  Creter said. She needed kindness from her peers, kindness from her mother and kindness from her teachers, but instead she was met with either people ignoring her or just open disdain.

A character analysis of Carrie reveals an adolescent who is unable to separate psychologically from her mother. Her body is perceived as possessed by an introject of an intrusive, domineering, and unempathic mother. Starvation serves as an unconscious means of destroying the internalized mother-object.