In Sophie's episodes, each act of disobedience or greed produces a direct, often physical, unpleasant consequence (the eaten fruit makes her sick, the hidden crime is exposed, the cruelty rebounds). The narrative asserts that misbehavior is not punished arbitrarily by adults but carries its own built-in result that teaches the lesson.
Sophie's wrongdoing is driven less by malice than by an unchecked impulse to try, taste, and take apart whatever she is forbidden or curious about. The engine of the misadventures is experimental impulse colliding with rules she does not yet internalize, not a desire to harm.
The book treats a child's small domestic failures (spoiled food, a broken toy, a drowned pet, a lie) as serious moral material worth narrating in full, rather than as trivial. Viewing childish mishaps through this lens makes ordinary daily mistakes the primary site where character is formed.