45 pages • 1 hour read
Natalie LloydHummingbird
Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 2022A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 23-27Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 23 Summary: “Becoming a Bird”
With Grace’s support, Olive auditions for the roles of the Bird of Joy and Emily Dickinson for the school play. After overcoming her nerves, she performs well in both roles—until she accidentally rolls over someone’s toe. Everyone laughs, ending her audition and leaving her embarrassed. Olive is discouraged, and Grace comforts her. Nester Tuberose, the second person to find the hummingbird in 1963, agrees to meet with them at the Ragged Apple Cafe.
Chapter 24 Summary: “The Mountain Ballerina”
Grace is especially excited to meet with entrepreneur Nester, who reveals she grew up resentful of the family’s apple orchard because her true passion was dancing. She intended to find the hummingbird and wish herself into a dance career. However, when she found the hummingbird, she knew, “I am a dancer anywhere, and everywhere I dance” (259). Ultimately, Nester’s wish was to do something that would bring her joy. She ended up loving the orchard and opening her own cafe, and still dances any time she wants to. The hummingbird’s feathers fall, and she agrees to be Grace’s mentor if Grace finds a client on her own.
Chapter 25 Summary: “Deep in the Woods”
Olive is cast as the Bird of Joy and is the understudy for Emily Dickinson. However, at the first rehearsal, she feels singled out by Mrs. Matheson. After rehearsal, she and Grace enter the woods to look for the hummingbird but are followed by Hatch.
Chapter 26 Summary: “The Nest”
Hatch formally joins the BlumeBird Society and shares his theory on the hummingbird riddle’s missing words: They are dependent on people’s wishes, what each person is missing. The trio finds rememory birds, whose collected memories appear as bubbled images. Olive spots a memory that shows a young boy and girl facing a bright light—the hummingbird. She calls Grace and Hatch over to see, but he is distracted by another memory—that of a white dog with floppy ears. He follows the memory into the woods, not noticing his comic fall out of his pocket.
Chapter 27 Summary: “Dance of the Martins”
Having picked up Hatch’s comic, Olive decides to read it for herself: Inside is a hand-drawn comic on notebook paper about him and his dog, Biscuit. At the end of the comic, the two are separated before being reunited. Hatch himself reveals that one day, Biscuit was scared by a thunderstorm and ran into the woods. He also reveals he rubs his sleeves because he has difficulty tolerating the touch of fabric; Biscuit’s presence helped him cope. Hatch encourages Olive to advocate for herself and make her dreams happen.
Later, Olive’s parents agree to help her onto the school stage so she can prove to Mrs. Matheson how important it is that she be able to physically act with the other performers. The family dances together in the kitchen, and Olive is reminded of Jupiter’s encouragement that she be anything she wants; however, everything falls apart the next day.
Chapters 23-27 Analysis
The pace of the novel quickens as Olive and Grace approach their goal of finding the hummingbird. The girls’ friendship develops as Grace offers support during difficult times, as she does when Olive feels she failed her audition in Chapter 23; meanwhile, Olive’s relationship with Hatch develops as he opens up to her in Chapter 26, reinforcing the theme of Friends and Family as the Most Important Magic. Hatch undergoes the most development in this section, as his mix of Fragility, Vulnerability, and Strength is finally contextualized. Olive realizes they share fragility: While she lives with OI, he has an invisible struggle that leads him to fixate on textures (292). This reinforces Miss Snow and Luther Frye’s earlier claim that all people harbor fragility. This revelation opens the door for Olive and Hatch to bond, with him ultimately supporting her dreams as Grace does.
Olive and Grace’s conversation with wish-maker Nester Tuberose in Chapter 24 foreshadows the novel’s conclusion on Existing with Limitations and introduces the idea that one’s “missing words” are a deeper truth. Nester’s words: “I am a dancer anywhere, and everywhere I dance” (259), acknowledge her potential to be and do as she wants, which is echoed by Jupiter regarding Olive’s limitations. Nester realized she didn’t need to leave home to nurture her passion, and Olive eventually learns she already has everything she needs to succeed. The rememory birds in Chapter 26 reinforce the novel’s magical realism, and also work as a plot device for later discoveries. One of the birds’ collected memories foreshadows the reveal of Grandpa Goad (and by extension, his future wife) as the third wish-maker of 1963: Olive notices a bubbled image in which “A boy in the woods faced a blinding light. I could only see his back, and the back of the girl beside him, who had long hair and wore a billowy dress. He reached for her hand. She reached for his” (281). However, moments like this and Chapter 27’s overall warm tone are disrupted by the final line of the chapter, which foreshadows Olive’s thigh bone break in Chapter 28: “It was a peaceful, perfectly, nearly summer night. And the next day, it all shattered to pieces” (297).
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By Natalie Lloyd
