The Probability of Miracles- character change

In the novel, “The Probability of Miracles”, by Wendy Wunder, the author decides to make the main character a cancer patient, giving you a look on the perspective of her life and how her cancer took a huge role in her life. Still in remission, Campbell has to deal with everyday symptoms throughout her daily routines. Even though being diagnosed with cancer doesn’t mean you can’t be social and make new friends, I feel that Cam is a very reserved character in the first half of the book. However, once I get into about the middle of the book, i found a slow, but very effective character change in Campbell.

In the beginning of the story, Cams personality is very reserved. She doesn’t  make herself do anything she doesn’t have to do. She is shy and doesn’t have many friends. For example, when her and her mom and sister Perry are about to go to Promise, (against Cams will) she starts packing her movies, planning to watch films all day on vacation. Doesn’t think she will be going out or meeting new people. Cam also doesn’t open up to people easily. When she has blue spots on her arm as a side effect from cancer, she tries to cover up so her grandma doesn’t notice. Even though it could be a concern or something serious, she doesn’t tell anyone because she wants to keep it to herself. She doesn’t even open up to her grandma! She doesn’t like to open up to new ideas either. Cam convinces herself throughout the book that miracles are not real and that everything happens for a reason, even though she knows deep down that they are miracles. A flock of flamingos in Maine, not moving from where they are. A dog that was due to die makes it through the night. Snowing in August. Letting your lobster free and while fishing a week later, fishes out the same one. All these happenings have no excuses and Cam knows it. Cam also doesn’t do anything new or want to do anything new unless she has to do it. Campbell brings along her flamingo list: a list she personally made in camp which lists things she has to do before she dies. So, Cam only does risky stuff when its on her flamingo list because it was a promise she made to herself. Cam shows a very reserved personality.

However, as I got towards the end of the story, I saw Cam slowly changing. She goes to a party on an island where as she wouldn’t have earlier in the book. She also opens up with her feelings more. She falls in love with Asher, a boy she meets in Maine. At the party she dances, met new people, and tried new things.  Campbell opens up more and decides to get a job, right away she tells the boss, Elaine, that she is sick and that is why she came to Maine- her and her family are looking for a miracle to cure herself. She also makes new friends in maine, like Sunny. Sunny and Cam start to hang out sometimes and Cam gets happier. She has friends, is in love, and cancer isn’t her life anymore. And most important of all, Cam starts to believe in miracles. This really showed me a huge character change because Cam would have never opened up this much to believe in something that we are not sure exactly exists. I was proud of Cam and thought her change was for the best, because she became so happy once she made friends and started going out.  

In, “The Probability of Miracles”, Campbell shows a big change in her personality which affected her life a lot. Being reserved and not having many friends wasn’t making her happy but I don’t think Cam wanted to change anything in her life and tried to stop herself from changing. But I realized that sometimes its hard to stop yourself from doing what’s best even though you don’t know what’s going to happen if you do change.

The Silver Star

Over the summer, I read the inspiring novel, “The Silver Star” by Jeannette Walls. This book is about the endless adventures of “Bean”, Liz, and Charlotte Holiday. Being a single mom looking for a purpose, Charlotte takes off one day and leaves the girls with enough money to last them for about two months. During those two months Bean and Liz live on their own, and they do just fine. But when the police come to investigate a report of two underage girls living with no guardian, they have to leave as soon as they can. However, with no way to contact their mother, where is there to go? Uncle Tinsley’s house in Virginia. Bean and Liz venture off to reunite with their long lost Uncle and find that he too, is flawed.  I love the message given in this story. Everyone has faults but you can learn to love them as they are.

I found that this theme came up very early in the story. Liz and Bean’s mother, Charlotte Holiday, was a debutante from the south who had always been the center of attention as a child. When she became a mother she ran away from her hometown in Byler, Virginia. I realized that Charlotte has a tendency to run from her mistakes instead of sorting them out. Liz and Bean also realize this. In the beginning of the book, Charlotte repeatedly left her daughters alone to find her career. In this way, Charlotte is running away from her responsibilities as an adult. I think this is one of Charlotte’s main faults, because she feels overwhelmed and needs to get away. But she’s not thinking about what that might mean to her daughters. Nobody is there for them. However, Charlotte is their mother and by the end of the book, they come to accept her and love her even though she struggles to take care of them, because she is pretty much all they have.

Another character that ties into the theme is Uncle Tinsley. When Liz and Bean first arrive at his house in Virginia, they find him to be quite a recluse. He comes to the door in a bathrobe and holding a shotgun across his chest. The house had been rotting and it wasn’t what Bean and Liz had remembered. I could already see that Uncle Tinsley was very reserved at the time, and I wondered what had made him this way. Later in the story we find out that Uncle Tinsley had been running the town’s cotton mill (Holiday Mill), just as generations before him in the Holiday family had. However, the business was doing poorly and had to be sold. Chicago investors bought the mill and Uncle Tinsley is just managing to make it by with the proceeds from the sale. Although it was the right thing to do, Uncle Tinsley felt as though he failed to uphold the family’s name and reputation around town. Struggling with money, Uncle Tinsley stayed at their house in Virginia and never left. Ever since his wife had died in a car accident, he had been alone. When Liz and Bean visit, they find flaws in Uncle Tinsley but they accept him as he is. At first he didn’t even want the girls in his home, ashamed by the rotting household. Later in the story, Liz and Bean are let into the house but feel the need to contribute to the family and household expenses. So, they ask to get jobs. However, Uncle Tinsley didn’t want the girls to have to help with the costs of running the house, even though he knew he was on a tight budget. Although uncle Tinsley specifically forbid them from getting jobs because the Holidays always had the reputation of having enough money, Liz and Bean go off to find jobs, disobeying Tinsleys rules and not telling him about it. Later in the story, this job causes lots of conflict and teaches them an important lesson.

Liz and Bean also were at  fault in this situation. Because they didn’t listen to Uncle Tinsley, they got themselves in big trouble that they could have easily avoided if they had just told Uncle Tinsley about it, or not gotten a job at all. I think Liz and Bean learned their lesson and when it was time to deal with the consequences of breaking their Uncles rules, they did not run away from the situation. Even though they broke their Uncles specific orders, they didn’t get in big trouble. I think Uncle Tinsley realized that the girls were just doing it to help, not cause trouble. He accepted the fact that they did it for him, and loved them for it.

In conclusion, the message in this story stood out to me so much and it showed me that everyone has flaws but that doesn’t mean that we can’t love and accept them anyway. We need to accept everyone’s flaws because we know we all have them. This book shows a great example of complicated family relationships and loving people for who they are.