The Miscalculations of Lightning Girl by Stacy McAnulty

Twelve-year-old Lucy Callahan was struck by lightning four years ago. Lucy was playing with her friend Cecelia, outside the apartment building she and Nana lived in when a sudden thunderstorm developed. Lucy decided to climb a chain link fence which was struck by lightning. The lightning strike knocked Lucy unconscious, stopping her heart, and her friend to the ground. Lucy's life was saved by the apartment maintenance man who was able to restart her heart with a defibrillator. Other than burns to her hands, Lucy seemed to be fine. That is until a week later.

While watching television with Nana, Lucy was inexplicably able to calculate the cost of a car from monthly payments in her head. Suddenly, Lucy who was in Grade 2 and learning addition and subtraction, could do difficult math calculations. Doctors diagnosed her with acquired savant syndrome, meaning she had developed a profound talent - in her case, the ability to do mathematics.

In reality, Lucy's brain was damaged by the lightning strike, part of the left lobe of her brain was shut down, resulting in the right side working overtime. Lucy can do advanced mathematical calculations, calendar math, recognize mathematical patterns and she "sees" math with every number having it's own colour and shape. Lucy also has a fear of germs which leads her to sanitize every surface she touches and she needs to sit/stand three times before she sits anywhere. She also needs to count all the words before she can read anything.

Because of all her peculiar habits, Lucy has been homsechooled since her accident and now at the age of twelve has passed high school, the GED and gotten perfects chores on her SATs. She wants to attend college but her nana believes she is too young.

Lucy's beloved Uncle Paul who is a marine visits their apartment before he moves away to California. He gives Lucy a pendant of a lightning bolt. During his short stay, he supports Nana in her decision to have Lucy attend public school. Lucy doesn't want to go to middle school but instead wants to go to college. She believes she can do everything online. However she hasn't left the apartment in four weeks and her only friends are online ones that she's made through the various math forums.

After a brief tour and a meeting with Dr. Cobb, principal of East Hamlin Middle School, Lucy is enrolled in Grade 7. Nana insists she attend for a year, "Make 1 friend. Do 1 thing outside o f these walls. Read 1 book not written by an economist or a mathematician." Lucy is certain that attending school will be a disaster.

Despite her strange habits and the fact that she's new to the school, Lucy does make two friends; Windy Sitton who loves musicals and is intrigued by Lucy's strangeness and Levi Boyd, a boy with two moms who loves photography and is caught cheating off of Lucy during their assessment in math class. Lucy is  made fun of and her strange habits earn her the label "cleaning lady". She spends most of her time attempting to hide her mathematical genius. She calculates how many questions she should get wrong on tests to that it won't look like she is hiding something. Lucy uses her math abilities to help her group of Windy and Levi in their class project. As her friendship with her two classmates grows, Lucy calculates that she can let them in on her secret - that she's really a math genius. However, Lucy begins to realize that while numbers can help predict certain things, not everything in life can be determined mathematically. She might be a math genius but Lucy discovers she's making many miscalculations about trust and the meaning of friendship.

Discussion

The Miscalculations of Lightning Girl is an enjoyable story about a young girl trying to come to terms with her differences while learning to trust and build friendships.

After her brain is damaged by a lightning strike, making her a math savant, Lucy Callahan believes her life is set, the equation of life has been solved - she will go to university and study math. Her unusual repetitive behaviours have forced her into the solitude of home, where she is taught by her Nana. But her wise Nana knows this is not healthy for Lucy and forces her into a year of school, to make a friend, and do something within the community. She knows this will be a difficult task for her young granddaughter who sees everything as numbers, but she hopes it will broaden Lucy's perspective.

And so Lucy enters school with the intention of simply surviving the year. However middle school forces her to interact with other people, something her mathematical abilities cannot really help her to do. Lucy uses her mathematical abilities to help her navigate life. She sees everything in mathematical terms. For example, the colours of clothing people all have numbers for Lucy. "I wear a teal-and-pink-striped shirt (like the colors of 107 and 42) and dark jeans." What Lucy can't understand are people and this difficulty leads to the inevitable crisis.

Initially she makes a good decision about who to tell about her mathematical gift. Although Windy is her budding friend, Lucy decides first to tell Levi about what happened to her at age eight. "I can't explain it, but I trust that Levi will keep my secret."  Despite the fact that Levi cheated off of her on their assessment and got them both in trouble, Lucy reasons, "Unlike Windy, he rarely talks about other people. I know I should get it over with and tell her, too. She's my best friend, and she shares every detail of her life with me...The problem is, she also tells me about everyone else. From her mom - who needs to wax a mustache - to which kids repeated kindergarten. There's no controlling information once it's in Windy's head. No vault. No lock and key. No secret combinations."

As it turns out Lucy was correct in her assessment of both Levi and Windy. She does eventually tell Windy who is upset that Levi knew before her. Levi explains to Windy that Lucy struggles to trust people. "Give her a break," Levi says, opening another box of candy. 'She did tell you a minute ago. Lucy's like a nervous teacup Chihuahua. She takes a while to trust someone.' " Levi likens himself to a trusty golden retriever.  Windy breaks Lucy's trust by revealing her secret at her birthday party.

While Lucy can understand advanced mathematical concepts she cannot understand Windy's betrayal of her secret. "For someone who is supposed to be smart, I can't figure out how to get Pi adopted, and I can't figure out Windy. Why did she tell my secret to someone who is always mean to her. She chose Maddie over me. Maddie." Lucy's miscalculation results in her feeling betrayed and angry. But when Windy confronts Lucy, apologizing for her actions, she forces Lucy to really listen to her. Lucy believes Windy told her secret "to get the other girls to like you by making fun of me..." however, Windy reveals that she wanted her friends to be Lucy's friends too. Lucy questions why Windy wants to be her friend and Windy states,  "You never complain about my love of musicals or my causess. You don't try to change people. It's like you're only trying to understand people."  Windy tells Lucy that she feels accepted. However for Lucy people will always be an unsolvable equation. "I will never understand people. In algebra, you can solve an equation when you have 1 unknown variable. People are equations with dozens of variables. Basically unsolvable."

By the end of the novel, Lucy is beginning to understand that life is not an equation with a set solution. For example, where she once thought that she would just want to move on to college, she now has several possibilities for schooling in January: she can continue on at East Hamlin, she can attend NCASME or she can home school. Attending school has also helped Lucy understand that others have their own problems something she comes to realize about classmate and mean girl, Maddie.

McAnulty has crafted a delightful novel about friendship, forgiveness and acceptance.  The Miscalcuations of Lightning Girl is populated with realistic, endearing characters from the trustworthy Levi, to Windy who thinks big and wants to save the world, to the understanding, kind Mr. Stoker who pushes Lucy to share her gift with the world. Overall  The Miscalculations of Lightning Girl is an enjoyed read.

Book Details:

The Miscalculations of Lightning Girl by Stacy McAnulty
New York: Random House     2018
293 pp.