Counting by 7s

Willow Chance is the main character of this novel. She is a 12-year-old who has been categorized as highly-gifted by educational counselors in her grade school. Dell Duke, her counselor at Sequoia, believes she is a genius. Willow realizes she is strange and accepts herself as she is. She searches for people who will accept her as she is. Willow loves the number 7. She studies medical conditions and likes to diagnose problems and suggest treatments. Willow draws comfort both from her garden and from books. Willow’s parents are killed in a car wreck early in the novel. Willow’s problem lies in the fact that her family had no close relatives and few friends. There is no one to take guardianship of Willow and this exceptional girl is in danger of being put into foster care. Because Willow has taken enough interest in Mai to learn Vietnamese so they can talk in Mai’s native language Mai becomes Willow’s champion, convincing her mother to take charge of the girl. Mai Nguyen becomes Willow’s champion after she realizes the girl has put so much effort into learning Vietnamese. Even though their families never knew each other, Mai lies to the police and tells them the two families were close. She manipulates her mother and convinces her to keep Willow for the night. Mai is self confident and not afraid to stand up for what she believes is right.

Willow continues her journey through the grieving process in this section of the novel, which covers about a month of time. It seems that this period of time is Willow’s rock bottom low time. She feels in the way with the Nguyen family. She even believes that Quang-ha hates her because she has made his life more unbearable. Willow continues to have a selective memory when it comes the things that involve her parents or their deaths. She can’t remember any of what is said at the memorial service, for example. Additionally, she’s lost interest in the things that used to preoccupy her mind. She doesn’t want to go to school, doesn’t want to think about gardening or medical conditions. She is tired and sleeps a good deal of the time. The thing she seems to concentrate on most is not being a burden to the Nguyen family. Willow seems to perk up a bit when she and Pattie first look at Dell’s apartment. She recognizes his apartment full of stuff is a sign of psychological disorder. She indicates that the “old her” would have really enjoyed observing Dell and being able to see first-hand someone suffering from this disorder. With her grief heavy on her mind, however, Willow feels only a prick of interest that seems to die away when Dell is not terribly upset because Pattie throws his things away. Remember also, that while the reader knew from prior descriptions of Dell’s apartment and lifestyle what Pattie would be facing when she decided to use Dell’s apartment as her own, Pattie and Willow were unaware how inattentive Dell was to his housekeeping. Although the task of cleaning Dell’s apartment is daunting, Pattie takes it on. Notice that in this section of the novel, Pattie and Dell really do go beyond the call of duty to give Willow a good place to live, even though they do go about it in an unconventional way. Until the first home visit is scheduled, Willow lives with Pattie in the garage. As soon as the first home visit is scheduled, Pattie goes into action making Dell’s apartment livable. Any other man might have refused to let a woman take charge of his home. Any other woman might have thought the work necessary to make Dell’s apartment livable was too much. Dell and Pattie dive in full force, however, even though Dell is mostly strong armed by Pattie into his part of the process. Notice also that because Willow has spent much of her life communicating with plants and learning about life from them, she still sees her life in comparison with the plant world. In this theme of thinking, Willow recalls that she’s heard about trees that have been burnt in fires but have survived. Although they appear dead at first, these trees eventually begin to grow new leaves and recover from their trauma. Willow hopes that she can be as resilient as these trees, but is afraid she may never recover.



One character in the book is named Dell Duke. Willow describes Dell Duke as not being a bad person, but being bad at being a person. Her description seems adequate for this overweight, underachieving school counselor. Before he meets Willow, Dell seems to avoid really getting involved in any other person’s life at all costs. With Willow, Dell gets dragged into the situation before he can really do anything to get away. Once he gets involved in Willow’s situation, Dell finds that he is capable of making changes, a metamorphosis that seems to surprise him. He begins losing weight and taking responsibility for his actions. He helps Willow with her projects and even briefly considers trying to get guardianship of her by himself. Another important character is Quang-ha Nguyen. Quang-ha Nguyen is Mai’s older brother. He is the reason why Willow and Mai meet. He is a deviant who Dell at first classifies as a lone wolf but later goes back and re classifies him as an oddball when he realizes the teen has artistic talent. Quang-ha is angry when Willow first comes to live with them. He has lost what little privacy he once had. Quang-ha has an artistic ability that intrigues Willow. She also helps him with his homework and his grades begin to improve though he seems to be irritated by his new status as a smart students. He also shows an interest in Willow’s gardening talent. Later, after the garden at the apartment complex is complete, Quang-ha tells Willow he doesn’t want to know how Willow did it, he wants to believe that she is magic. Another Important character is Mai Nguyen. Although Quang-ha is Mai’s older brother, Mai has been in charge of keeping Quang-ha out of trouble for years. She is the opposite of her angry, deviant brother. Mai is intelligent and keeps out of trouble. Mai’s life is enriched by Willow because her family is finally able to move out of the garage in which they’d lived for so many years. She has her own bed and a room she shares only with Willow.