Counting by 7s book review By Dante

Setting This book’s setting is in Bakersfield, CA and takes place in the present.

Point of view This book is told in 2 points of view. Some parts of this book are told in first person, while other parts are told in 3rd person limited.

Plot map Background Rising Action Climax Falling Action Resolution Willow, Mai, etc. are introduced as well as the setting. Willow notices her parents don’t answer her messages. Willow finds out her parents are dead. Willow changes and tries to recover from her parent’s deaths. Willow eventually recovers and wants to do new things.

Theme One theme of this book is family because Willow loves her parents. Another theme is overcoming obstacles because Willow has to deal with her parents dying.

How the author used flashback In the first part of the story, the group goes to get ice cream and Willow’s parents die. Then Willow finds out and then the story flashes back. to the events before the accident (2 months ago) until the story catches up with the accident.

Examples of foreshadowing and symbolism One example of foreshadowing is that Willow notices her mom and dad not answering her messages, signaling something happened. In Counting by 7s, 7 is a recurring number that the author uses a lot in her book. 7 is also Willow’s favorite number.

Important quotes Willow Mai Pattie “7 is a natural number. And it is a prime number. There are 7 basic types of catastrophes. And 7 days of the week.” Page 376. It is important because it shows how Willow changed. “Don’t you raise your voice at us! He didn’t do anything wrong. If y brother wants to finish the picture, he’ll finish the picture!” Page 72. It shows that Mai is determined and strong-willed. “It’s Pattie”. Page 370. This quote shows Pattie cares about herself.

How the characters changed Willow Mai Quang-ha Dell Pattie Jairo At first she was a person who would count by 7s when she was bored and was a medical expert. After the accident, she wouldn’t tell any health tips. At first Mai seems kind of serious but later on she changes to be more fun-loving although she can get serious sometimes. At first, Quang-ha was a troublemaker kid. Now that Willow had been introduced to his life, he is trying to pay more attention. Dell was at first a fat man with not much responsibility but when he meets Willow, he starts getting healthier. The mother of 2 kids, Pattie had changed her name because she found what her past name meant in English. She was also discovered to be a hoarder and became a bit of a dictator. Jairo changed from being lonely to having Friends like Willow and Pattie.

My opinion of the novel I think this novel scores a 4.7 out of 5 because this novel, although tragic events happen, there was a lot of work put into this novel. I can tell because there are a lot of characters that make this book more interesting.