Labels, Categories

The difficulty with making people fit a category or label is a major theme in this novel. Willow struggles with the pressure put on her when she is labeled. Similarly, Dell Duke tries to make sense of his world by putting the students he counsels into categories. He quickly learns that people often don’t meld completely into any one grouping.

Early in her life, Willow is saddled with labels. The kids in her class refer to her as a weirdo. When she’s evaluated by an educational consultant, she is labeled as highly gifted, a description that Willow doesn’t even completely understand. Dell Duke later struggles to create a category in which the place the exceptional child. He eventually comes up with the label of genius. Later, when Willow sees his categorization system, she does not agree with his act of classifying her...