The Summer Book

Sophia’s book in “Of Angleworms and Others” becomes another way for her to process her mother’s death, invoking Healing From Loss. The angleworm that she accidentally cuts in half represents her family, which was severed by the loss of Sophia’s mother. The two halves of the worm can be interpreted as symbolizing Sophia and her Father, with Father representing the head end and Sophia the tail. Sophia feels disconnected from her father, which is demonstrated in several of Sophia’s dictated lines: “I think they looked at each other, and thought they looked awful, and then crawled away from each other as fast as they could” (136). She seems to feel that Father wants freedom over family: “But maybe the front end thinks it’s nice not having anything to drag around behind it, but who knows, because it’s hard to tell” (137). This excerpt also suggests that Father is incommunicative, which has made it difficult for Sophia to understand or connect with him.

The small animals of Sophia’s second chapter represent Sophia’s mother and her inferred slow death. Sophia sees the small animals as frustratingly delicate and helpless, and she has an outburst while dictating and declares she hates “everything that dies slow” and “everything that won’t let you help” (138). Grandmother understands Sophia is using the book as an outlet to heal from the loss of her mother, and she shows Sophia love and compassion by writing the book without criticizing her. “Sophia’s Storm” is another allegorical tale that addresses the death of Sophia’s mother. Sophia correlates her boredom with tragic events. Her self-blame for causing the destructive storm symbolizes her guilt over her mother’s death. It suggests that Sophia had prayed for something interesting or dramatic before her mother fell ill and died. Grandmother helps, again, by assuring Sophia that she is not the cause of the storm and, symbolically, she is not the cause of her mother’s death. These two vignettes demonstrate the importance of support while Healing From Loss.

“Day of Danger” depicts another stage in Sophia’s process of Healing From Loss as her attention shifts toward keeping Father safe. After Grandmother shares stories about her own grandmother, Sophia becomes fearful that something bad might happen to Father and that she might lose him too. Instead of devolving into fits, as she has done in the past, she asks Grandmother for help to create a protection elixir. Sophia is maturing and moving away from childish self-centeredness and developing a sense of empathy. Grandmother, who has struggled to share memories in the past, openly talks about her grandmother, passing along ancestral stories to Sophia. This demonstrates that Grandmother, too, has grown and can reflect on her life with pleasant feelings.

The final vignette “August” depicts the family preparing to leave the island until next year, and the story alludes to Grandmother’s impending death. Grandmother starts preparing the house early, leaving detailed notes. Grandmother and Father’s attitude toward the house—leaving it open and supplied for any shipwrecked or storm-tossed visitors—contrasts strongly with the newcomer’s possessive, “no trespassing” approach that incensed Grandmother in “The Neighbor.” Their preparations and communal attitude toward property and access reflect their traditional way of living on the island.

Although she claims the notes are for emergency winter visitors, Grandmother may also be leaving instructions for the tasks that she usually completes in the spring. Grandmother has watched both Father and Sophia, and she feels that they are ready to carry on without her. Sophia is old enough to show empathy for Father, as demonstrated in “Day of Danger,” and Grandmother has noticed Sophia growing closer with Father: “She blew out the light and listened to Sophia and her father getting ready for bed on the other side of the wall” (164). Grandmother resents feeling helpless, symbolized in her chamber pot and her refusal to use it, once more reflecting The Difficulties of Age-Related Limitations. The ending of the story is ambiguous: Grandmother thinks she hears a motorboat, but the sound is the pounding of her own heart, which suggests she is having some sort of cardiac event. The tale ends with Grandmother sitting outside on a stump, and it is left unresolved as to whether she survives her sudden heart issue. The ambiguous ending allows for individual interpretation, suggesting that, just as the season is changing, other changes may be coming to the family’s lives.