My Life as a Book

A multidimensional character who experiences growth during the novel, Derek’s mother is the key influence in his life. Because Derek is an only child, he spends a lot of time with his parents. His mother works at a veterinary clinic and has compassion for both animals and humans. Derek often assists his mom at the clinic or just goes there to visit the animals. By helping his mother at work, Derek learns about responsibility and caring for something other than himself; his experiences at the clinic help him be a better owner for his dog, Bodi. Derek is lucky enough to meet Pedro the helper monkey, a patient at the clinic, as this leads him to meeting Michael, who helps him learn to animate his drawings. Derek’s mother tries to encourage him to read, and Derek sometimes feels pressured by her regarding his education; despite this conflict, Derek loves his mother and her support helps him overcome obstacles.

Derek’s mother shows patience and empathy toward her son, bribing him with chocolate chips to get him to read and giving in to his pleas to visit his grandma before the summer ends. She often finds Derek amid dangerous or destructive acts, such as using all the dinner avocadoes as grenades in a game with Matt or playing croquet on the garage roof. When Derek’s mother gets mad at him, which is rare, Derek refers to it as “MomMad.” Fortunately for Derek, his mom has a keen sense of humor and uses it to cope with her son’s antics and stubbornness.

She reacts suspiciously when Derek first finds the newspaper article about Susan, refusing to tell him anything about it for days. Finally, she gives in and tells Derek all about how Susan drowned trying to save him. When the family visits Martha’s Vineyard, however, they learn that Susan didn’t drown trying to save Derek. Although this is a relief, Derek’s mother feels deeply betrayed by Madeline, Susan’s mother. However, when she meets Madeline and sees her grief, she refrains from confronting Madeline about the real story. An emotional person, Derek’s mother cries with Madeline as they talk about Susan. Before the family leaves for home, they stop at the beach where Susan died, as well as Lambert Cove. Derek’s mother seems lighter, as if a load has been lifted from her shoulders. She no longer wonders if Derek had a part in Susan’s death, and although Derek initiated investigating and closing the case of Susan James, his mother needed to heal from it most.

An illustrator, Derek’s father is a hero for him because he wants to be an illustrator too. Derek’s dad works drawing storyboards for various movies, and sometimes he allows Derek to join him at his office. Derek describes his dad’s work drawings as “the kind of basic drawings I make for my vocabulary words but with better backgrounds and from different angles” (35). Derek enjoys going to his dad’s workplace and seeing all the movie props and actors that his dad uses to create storyboards. One day, he joins his father there when he’s drawing for a horror movie. Derek gets to see all the gory props and a female actor covered in blood. Later, when Derek sneaks Pedro out of his cage and his mother catches him playing with the monkey in the house, he jokes that her expression is “scarier than an actress in one of dad’s horror movies” (62).

Derek’s dad struggles with getting older and seeing how his way of drawing storyboards is becoming traditional and outdated. He enviously glares at a younger illustrator who has a goatee, and Derek gets the idea to draw one on him (inadvertently with a permanent marker) later while he’s asleep. Luckily, Derek’s dad has a good sense of humor and remarks, “It’s actually not that bad” (38). In addition, Derek offers some helpful support for his dad’s professional conflict, inspiring his dad to try computer animation after learning about it from Michael. In this way, Derek’s dad is a character who begins to change throughout the novel. While originally stuck in his old ways, he starts to realize that if he wants his son to be open to reading, he needs to be open to change and new approaches as well. Derek’s dad thus inspires Derek to overcome obstacles while overcoming his own.

Derek’s foil and the person who challenges him the most is Carly, a multidimensional character whom Derek initially considers just another smart teacher’s pet who thinks she’s better than everyone else. He characterizes her in his narrative by describing his brief interactions with her, which slowly morph into more meaningful interactions. In the beginning, Derek and Carly are abrasive toward one another. As the summer progresses and Derek must be around Carly at Learning Camp, however, he starts to see more to her personality than he originally thought. Carly even participates in some of the reading exercises that Margot creates for Derek. Carly takes home Ginger, the class hedgehog, for the summer.

One afternoon after camp, Derek’s mom drops Carly off at her house. She and Derek go inside for a visit, and Derek discovers that Carly has created a highly innovative and intricate burglar laser maze out of fishing line in her basement. Derek can’t believe that Carly has time to both read all the books on the summer list and create this game, though Carly says it isn’t difficult. While Derek is on vacation in Martha’s Vineyard, Ginger the hedgehog dies in Carly’s care. Carly’s mom calls Derek’s mom (because she’s a veterinarian), and when Derek finds out, he asks to speak to Carly. In a rare show of empathy and patience, Derek listens as Carly cries: “I sit in the sand and listen, caught between the waves and Carly’s sobs” (183). Derek and Carly now have a fundamental experience in common: they both feel sad about someone else’s death. For Derek, that someone was Susan, and when he assures Carly that she did nothing wrong, he’s also reassuring himself. When he returns home, Derek takes Matt to Carly’s house and helps her plant flowers in the garden for Ginger. For Derek, Carly becomes one of many people whose story makes his summer more vibrant and meaningful.

Matt is Derek’s best friend, and the novel characterizes him through his relationship with Derek. He remains a static character throughout the novel, largely because Matt leaves for the summer to go on vacation to the East Coast with his family. Before Matt leaves, he and Derek enjoy some early summer days and hijinks together, and Matt serves as a source of joviality and youth for Derek as he starts to grow up. They create a war game out of dirt mounds and use avocadoes as grenades, skateboard around town, and laugh together. Matt is goofy, immature, and loyal. He’s always with Derek, and when Derek wants to go with Matt on vacation, Matt asks his parents, but his pleas are unsuccessful, so Matt calls Derek while he’s there to tell him everything he finds out about Martha’s Vineyard and Susan James. His relationship with Derek is tight, and Derek sometimes feels like “Matt can read [his] mind” (92). They’re always in agreement and hatching up similar plans. When Matt returns from his vacation, he’s surprised to see that not only has Derek changed but that Derek is now friends with Carly. Matt is his usual goofy (and slightly rude) self at first, but when he realizes that Carly is genuinely upset over the loss of Ginger the hedgehog, he agrees to help her plant flowers.

Derek’s teacher, Ms. Williams, is enthusiastic about learning, outgoing, and empathetic. Although a static character in the novel, Ms. Williams helps Derek see reading from a new perspective—and challenges Derek’s notions of what a teacher is supposed to be when he sees her outside school dressed in a “Red Hot Chili Peppers tank top and high-top sneakers” (130). Ms. Williams gives the class a summer reading list at the end of the school year, much to Derek’s chagrin. She requires each student to read at least three books and create reports on them. Carly, a classmate of Derek’s, enthusiastically finishes the entire list. Derek is a reluctant reader and struggles to finish just one, but he does overcome this obstacle with help from Ms. Williams, Michael, and his Learning Camp counsellor, Margot.

To encourage Derek to read, Ms. Williams gives him a gift that she doesn’t give any other student. On the last day of school, she hands him a book from the list—one she thinks he’ll like. The plot centers on a boy and his dog, much like Derek and Bodi. She even annotated the book for Derek, including prompts and questions to help him visualize the setting and empathize with the characters. Derek finds the process grueling at first, but when Margot teaches him to visualize the words like a movie, he puts the two pieces together and finishes the novel. When school is back in session, Derek presents his book report as an animation like the vocabulary drawings he created throughout the summer. Ms. Williams approves of Derek’s unique adaptation of a book report, and Derek is proud of his accomplishment.