The Probability of Miracles

By: Wendy Wunder

Perspective:

A teenager dying of neuroblastoma told through a narrator.

Overall impressions:

This book delves into the subject of end of life and palliative care and a sense of normalcy during this experience. This book does not go deep into the physical/medical details of someone who is dying but still touches on the various emotions associated with the process. Overall, the book is lighthearted, funny, and engaging and includes a variety of typical teenage experiences that stress the normalcy someone can experience when given the opportunity to live out their final weeks as they wish.

Summary and Review:

Cam has been sick for quite some time and has always known that as a teen diagnosed with Neuroblastoma there was a chance that treatment would not work for her. She experienced clinical trial upon clinical trial and has had a very abnormal adolescence because of it. She does not, however, ever imagine to hear that there is nothing else that can be medically done for her. At that point, Cam’s mom quits her job to become a full time “miracle hunter” taking Cam to acupuncturists, reiki masters, reflexologists, herbalists, hypnotists, a Samoan medicine woman, and has even made phone appointments to distance healers. Though skeptical, Cam goes along with her mother’s wishes which eventually leads them to seek out a so-called miracle town in Maine called Promise.

All along the journey to Promise and once they settle in, Cam’s little sister Perry keeps a notebook full of miracles big and small that she witnesses. A flock of flamingos comes to settle in Maine. They obtain free housing in a mansion upon arrival in the town. Their bird, who they lost along their journey at Grandma’s house in New Jersey, finds them. All of which give Perry and their mother hope that Cam’s cancer will be cured by Promise’s magic. Even Cam struggles to explain things away when her blueberry spots disappear and she is feeling the best she has in some time.

Though Cam doesn’t believe in the miracle properties of Promise, there is one thing she cannot deny. She has never felt more alive than she has while living in Promise. Things that she had put on a bucket list (which she calls a Flamingo List) at camp with her best friend, Lily, just start coming to fruition without her even planning them to. For the first time in what feels like forever she gets to act like a normal teen. She goes to parties, dances with her friends, and even falls in love with.

Life, however, cannot exist without ups and downs. Along with these points of bliss, Cam also experiences the loss of her best friend to the same disease she is battling, suicidal thoughts, teenage heartbreak, and the ultimate struggle of accepting that she does not have a future in the way that her new friends in Promise do Despite her mix of normal teenage struggles and those brought on by her illness, she slowly completes her bucket list along with those on Lily’s list that she never got to. She also is able to help her family find peace happiness that will help them through her passing. When the end approaches, Cam feels the fevers and pain coming but hides them from the people she loves. In some ways, it feels like she is hoping that if she hides it, it’s not actually happening.

When the end approaches, Cam comes to accept some revelatory notions that being in Promise afforded her: 1. Thoughts are energy, energy is matter, and matter doesn’t disappear. 2. Pay attention to coincidence. 3. You can change your identity. 4. Only the present moment matters. When Cam passes she is surrounded by her loved ones and feels fulfilled knowing that in Promise, she was truly able to live. “Promise hadn’t saved her, but she understood now that it had made her life more complete than if she lived a hundred years in Orlando” (p. 354).

Although there is more metaphor and reading between the lines in this book than some of the other young adult novels I have been reading, there is much to connect with in this book. Making the most of the time you have and fulfilling your wishes while you have time and having a good death. Wanting to ensure that life will go on for your family when you’re gone but that they will never forget you. The inability to connect with others who have the luxury of a future you will never have.

This book, being told through a narrator’s perspective and using more metaphor also allows the reader some distance. It is overall light in nature, funny, witty, and engaging. The reader is drawn to Cam, can relate to Cam, worries about Cam, but always knows that in some way things will turn out okay for Cam.

The overall message of this book is that time is precious and that anyone whose time is running out deserves the option of deciding how to spend that time. For some, it may be fighting and striving for a cure. For others it may be a trip to Promise and whatever that means for them.

Recommended for:

I would recommend this book for patients who are considered “palliative care” and have started to come to terms with the inevitability that they will have a premature death. I would especially recommend it for those who have a family member or caregiver who is struggling to do so and feels the need to keep fighting and protecting their child or relative. This may also be a good recommendation for those needing some validation in their decision to end treatment because of adversity they may be experiencing in outside (non medical) perspectives of the situation. This is especially a good book for those who use humor and laughter as a coping mechanism.

Not recommended for:

I would not recommend this book for anyone who has yet to come to terms with a terminal diagnosis or whose condition is not in fact terminal as it may spark unnecessary concerns and grief reactions. I would also not recommend this to anyone who is considered clinically depressed or has suicidal ideations as the main character of this book does unsuccessfully attempt suicide. This book also has the potential of offending those who strongly believe in the healing powers of medicine, those with strong religious beliefs (as this book touches on beliefs in Christianity but also the main character discredits aspects of Christianity), or who are strongly conservative. The book also touches on sex and drugs and therefore it may not bee a good recommendation for anyone who may not be mature enough to handle those topics.

Notable quotes:

“The PET scan had showed Cam’s skeleton shimmering like a Christmas tree with glowing nodules of cancer draped around her center like a garland of lights. The cross-section view of her torso looked otherworldly, like a view from the Hubble telescope or from a place deep underwater, aqueous and murky, except, again, for the bright glowing ember of cancer, which Dr. Handsome did not like to see.” P. 27

“Cam blinked her eyes open in the bright turquoise pool. It was harder to tell that you were crying when your head was underwater. Plus the cold water felt good on the lovely blue- spotted rash that she was developing all over her forearms, called “blueberry spots.” What a cute little name for a cancerous lesion.” P. 32

“Their families were so close, but they had only ever talked about the cancer. It had consumed their lives and their interactions. Blood counts, new trials, break-throughs, symptoms, and ways to get more energy, more life.” P. 76

“It wasn’t that giving up on western medicine didn’t frighten Cam. Western medicine was her life. Her whole identity had become wrapped up in leukocytes and lymphocytes and neuroblasts and metastasis, chemo, radiation, surgery, procedures. And none of it mattered. The entire trillion-dollar cancer industry and all of its machinery, Cam now realized, was for naught. All the pain it caused. All the bone-marrow transplants. For naught. The war on cancer, like any war, was useless except for its ability to stimulate the economy. Drugs were being sold. Doctors were getting paid. Pharmaceutical companies were getting rich. Cam had become collateral damage in the war on cancer. And she was done with all of it. She was throwing in la toalla.” P. 78

“Because she had to be prepared for the inevitable. The very real thing that was happening to her. It made no sense to get her hopes up.” P. 141

“Cam stepped inside the music and let it close around her like a bubble. Inside the music there was no cancer. No awkwardness. No pain. No abandonment. No Flamingo List. Inside the music, even inside these primitive rhythms, Cam felt free.” P. 147

“Maybe it was how she woke up this morning, but she was thinking about death a lot today. She thought about how it would happen… Her lungs slowly filling up with fluid, drowning in her own bed, suddenly finding herself without breath, and then without sight or hearing, and then eventually without even the capacity to dream. Without love. That was the saddest and scariest part about it. To be suddenly, eternally without love.” P. 208

“’Primum non nocere. First do no harm.’ Cam knew all about it. When treating cancer, it’s the first thing they throw out the window. They go after the tumor with bold disregard for the rest of your cells that are humming along innocently, minding their own business, trying to keep you alive. Often it’s the treatment that kills you before the disease would. If nothing else came out of this trip, Cam was at least glad she wasn’t spending her summer being poisoned by well meaning oncologists.” P. 230

“’I think it’s a transitive verb, pass,’ Cam finally said. ‘It requires an object. You can pass a test. Pass a football. Pass gas. You yourself cannot just pass.’” P. 236

“Strangely enough, Cam felt safe here. Back in the hallowed, sterilized halls of Western medicine, her journey had come full circle. “ P. 351

“’I will never be the same when you are gone. Things for me will be dim and gray and flat. But there is one thing that will keep me going, Campbell, and that is a belief in my connection to you. This thing. This crazy enmeshed love feeling that I have for you is real. Like this cup is real. Or this phone is real. And it will not just go away when you do. Okay? Wherever you are going, you will be connected to me by this thing, and you will never, ever be alone, okay? I want you to know that.” P.354 (Campbell’s mother to Campbell before she passes.)