Melody did not kill her goldfish.
When the goldfish jumped out of its cage, Melody tried to scream to get her mother’s attention. When the fish’s flopping body slowed toward a stop and Melody’s mother still hadn’t appeared, Melody wheeled herself over to the fishbowl and knocked it over to at least wet her pet’s gills keeping him alive for another instant in case help showed up. But when Melody’s mother finally came in the room, saw the overturned fishbowl and Melody’s fresh tears she thought Melody had knocked the pet out of the bowl and killed it on purpose.
Melody’s mother clucked with disappointment as she flushed the toilet, and still Melody didn’t explain.
Why not? Because Melody can’t. Although she has a brain ripe with trivia and photographic memories, Melody has such limiting CP she cannot walk, hold a pencil, or express herself verbally.
I picked up Sharon Draper’s Out of My Mind because the idea of being trapped in your own brain has always been terrifying to me. I love to write about the physical body of my characters but the thought of taking on a character who is so limited by disease that she cannot move independently or express herself is so daunting that I just had to see how Draper did it.
Out of My Mind is a fascinating look at the power of language and how even it can be trumped by the power of a truly great human spirit. Melody, Draper’s main character and narrator, is a hero. The odds are stacked against her from the start and continue to pile throughout the book, yet she manages to change her circumstances by knowing how and when to accept the help of her greatest resources—the well-rounded characters of her parents, neighbor, aide, and baby sister.
The book is not without its issues—it slogs through a good chunk of backstory before the plot gets rolling and the characters that act as obstacles to Melody are largely one-dimensional. However, Draper manages to truly chapter the unbeatable spirit of a ten-year-old who will let nothing, not even her own body, hold her back.
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