70 pages • 2 hours read
Teresa TotenThe Unlikely Hero of Room 13B
Fiction | Novel | YA | Published in 2013A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Symbols & Motifs
Chaos and Order
Adam’s main OCD compulsions involve counting in sets and performing clearing rituals to enter new thresholds. Trying to explain his thoughts, he says, “I believe there are times that my molecules are nuclear and that they’ll explode, raining radiation on all those I love unless I execute certain cleansing and clearing rituals, but I’m going to work on that too” (134). Adam copes with the stress and chaos of life is by neutralizing any anxieties or threats through his cleansing rituals. This motif connects to Adam’s biggest fear, which is confrontation with his mother and other forms of chaos. It also connects to the theme about perceived heroism because Adam clears chaos in an attempt to save others through his OCD compulsions.
Additionally, Carmella symbolizes the constant chaos in Adam’s life because of her excessive hoarding problem. She collects so much junk that their house becomes a physical manifestation of all the chaos in Adam’s life. This becomes increasingly apparent as Adam’s threshold issue is most troublesome at home, and it only gets worse the longer he lies about the toxic letters Carmella receives. He simultaneously feels that he is at fault for all the chaos in his life and that he alone can protect his loved ones. Eventually, the situation becomes so untenable that Adam can’t clear his front door to go inside. The chaos reaches a tipping point, which leads to the climax of the novel in Chapter 38, when Adam overcomes his fear to save his mom. This connects to the theme of facing one’s fear because Adam is able to accept reality and demonstrate that he has truly come of age.
Secrets and Lies
Secrets and lies are a common motif throughout the novel that supports the theme about facing reality. In the beginning of the book, Adam tells Chuck that lying makes him sick, but Chuck says that everybody lies. Adam has to keep the threatening letters a secret, and though he feels sick lying to people about them, he feels discussing them would be even worse: “There would be consequences. His mom had laid it out hard a couple of years ago. Talking about the house would be a betrayal. If he betrayed her, they would take her away” (53).
However, Adam comes to recognize that his mother has been lying to him about the letters and the garbage bags full of junk. In reality, Carmella is sending the letters to herself and filling the garbage bags with newspapers rather than cleaning their overcrowded home. As Adam accepts the truth about these lies, and as he sees the full picture of his reality, he is able to confront several of his fears and get his mom the help she needs. He says, “Maybe everybody has a damn good reason to lie. Maybe we all lie to hide the hurt or fake being strong until we can be strong” (277). In the end, Adam learns that lies have some utility as a coping strategy or protective mechanism, but truth and honesty are what enable to true growth and recovery.
Adam’s Height
When Adam first notices that Robyn is taller than him, he immediately makes a goal to grow taller. While teenagers have a natural eagerness to grow, be older, and mature, Adam dreams of being something more than himself, never thinking he is good enough. From this moment, the novel repeatedly describes how Adam is growing taller, using his physical growth to symbolize his emotional growth. His recovery is difficult—he experiences setbacks just as often as breakthroughs—but his physical growth is constant and consistent, assuring readers that Adam will eventually find peace and relief.
