In the novel Al Capone Does My Shirts, the protagonist, Moose, moves with his family to Alcatraz so his father can begin a job as a prison guard.
Moose is in seventh grade and must start a new school, while his sister, Natalie, who is autistic, hopes to get accepted into a special school in San Francisco.
Moose misses his old baseball buddies from his former school and doesn't yet know how he will fit in with his new classmates. The negative effects of the move for Moose are more noticeable at first; his sister is not accepted into the school in San Francisco, so Moose must "babysit" her after school everyday. Moose's mother is a music teacher and Moose's father is busy with his job, so that leaves Moose to take care of her. Since Natalie is autistic, this is a very difficult task.
Moose also becomes acquainted with a classmate named Piper who just happens to be the daughter of the warden of the prison. The enterprising Piper develops a scheme by which she hopes to make extra money from classmates by offering to have their clothes washed by the world-famous Al Capone. Moose has no choice but to help Piper, as he wants to stay in her good graces. Moose is later found guilty by association.
The positive effects of the move to Alcatraz show up a little later. Moose eventually does make friends, especially with Scout, with whom he enjoys playing baseball. And although Moose is still angry with Piper for involving him in the laundry plan, he decides to ask for her help in getting Natalie accepted to the special school in San Francisco. Natalie decides to stick a note in one of the sleeves of Al Capone's shirt. Within days, Moose finds out that Natalie has been accepted to the prestigious school:
Moose finds a note from Capone in the sleeve of one of his convict-washed shirts that simply says: "Done."
Moose learns to appreciate life on Alcatraz and to understand his parents and his sister in deeper ways.
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At first, the move to Alcatraz Island seems entirely negative for Moose. He is leaving behind his friends and a regular life on the mainland for a more isolated, and certainly unusual, life on an island. This causes a lot of anxiety as he acclimates to this new existence. Another negative effect, from Moose's point of view, is that he feels imprisoned, so to speak, by his duties watching his autistic sister, Natalie, each day after school while his mother attends to business on the mainland. He misses playing baseball on the one "off" day he has from caring for Natalie, and causes tension between Moose and his best friend, Scout.
As the story progresses, more positive attributes of the move are revealed. For one, Moose gains increasing empathy for Natalie—to the point where, at the end of the story, he apparently enlists the aid of a notorious criminal housed on Alcatraz, Al Capone, to help get Natalie into a promising new school for her condition. Moose also gains insight into human nature, as he deals with a hypocritical warden and her conniving daughter, then indirectly with a pair of prisoners—Capone, and "Number 105," who walks Natalie by the hand one day when Moose leaves her unattended.
The unique situation stirs a lot of personal growth for Moose. He wrestles with morality, in both how to deal with a laundry scheme, and in urging his mother at the end to stop being deceptive about Natalie's age.
Moose is not particularly thrilled to move to Alcatraz Island because he shares the island with notorious convicts; therefore, a negative effect of the move is that he feels jumpy. In fact, he plans to sleep in his clothes so that he does not meet a convict while wearing his pajamas. Another negative effect of the move is that he has to move away from his old friends, which includes his best friend, Pete.
A positive result of his move is that his sister, Natalie, can attend the Esther P. Marinoff School, which his family hopes will help her (as she has autism). Moose wants his sister to get help, though he will miss her, so this is a positive effect of the move. In addition, moving is positive because Moose's dad has a solid job as an electrician at the prison. When Natalie leaves the island to attend school, Moose has more time to spend with his father.
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