The Wishing Game

Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2023

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Summary

Background

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Prologue-Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Character Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Book Club Questions

Tools

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Discussion Questions

Part 2Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Part 2: “Tick-Tock. Welcome to the Clock”

Part 2, Interlude Summary

In another excerpt from Jack’s first book, The House on Clock Island, Astrid and her brother, Max, travel to the house on Clock Island. Max is apprehensive, but Astrid is determined to meet the Mastermind and rings the front doorbell. A mechanical voice greets them and asks them a riddle: “What can’t be touched, tasted, or held but can be broken?” (69) After a moment, Astrid figures out that the answer is “a promise,” and the voice welcomes them to the Clock.

Part 2, Chapter 7 Summary

Hugo stands, watching the boats and ferries come and go, as Jack organizes everything for his contest in the house. As a known relative of Jack’s, Hugo receives many phone calls, texts, and requests for interviews about the new book, which he declines.

He contemplates their relationship, specifically how he, at age 21, came to work for Jack as his illustrator after winning Jack’s art competition. At the time, he flew to Clock Island and acted in a way he now considers brash and idiotic but back then considered the hallmark of being a “serious artist.” Hugo requested clear directions on how to make Jack’s book covers, but Jack instead gave him free reign and told him to have fun. Jack’s argument was that Hugo didn’t tell Jack how to do his art (how to write), so Jack was ill-placed to tell Hugo how to do his. Jack made a comparison to Hugo’s favorite toy, a Batmobile given to him by his mother. He asked Hugo how his mother would have felt had he left the toy in its box; he said she would have been heartbroken. For Jack, Hugo’s ability to do art was very much like his love for that Batmobile—if he left it in its box and didn’t use it freely, the outcome would be heartbreak. Hugo took Jack’s advice and created a painting he loved, which Jack approved as the first novel’s cover.

Emerging from his memory, Hugo descends from his vantage point, where the house waits for the first contestants of Jack’s new competition to arrive. He promises himself that he’ll stay until the contest ends to ensure that nothing breaks, including Jack himself.

Part 2, Chapter 8 Summary

Theresa drives Lucy to the airport. On the way, Lucy is thankful she never told Christopher that she wouldn’t be able to adopt him. She’s determined to win the contest so that she can sell Jack’s book and have enough money to meet the adoption agency’s criteria. Theresa asks about the contest and whether Lucy will meet with Sean, her ex-boyfriend. Lucy promises that she won’t. Theresa takes a detour before arriving at the airport and surprises Lucy by taking her to see Christopher before her trip for moral support.

The text then pivots to when Lucy first introduced Christopher to the Clock Island books. When he discovered his parents dead in their kitchen, the social worker asked him about a grownup that could take care of him since they couldn’t contact a relative. Christopher gave them Lucy’s name. While he stayed with her, she used the books as a distraction and a way to get him to speak again. When the social worker came to collect him after a week, Lucy decided to adopt him.

Back in the present, Lucy gives Christopher the three sharks she bought for him at the children’s toy store. Christopher then tells her he has wished for her to win, providing her with the confidence to take on the contest. At the airport, however, she receives a phone call from Sean. He makes small talk and asks to see her when she’s in town. Lucy refuses. He tries to rehash their past, mentioning that he has the right to know about “the kid,” and speaks callously to her when she confirms that he’s not a father. Lucy hangs up on him and heads to her plane. She resolves to win and buy Christopher everything in The Purple Turtle when she has the money.

Part 2, Chapter 9 Summary

Lucy lands early in Portland and, after a while, meets her driver. She asks for his name, and he tells her he’s called Mike, or “Mikey, if you likey.” He takes her the rest of the way to the house on Clock Island and reassures her that the contest won’t be dangerous and that everyone is nice—the contestants, Jack, and sometimes even Hugo.

At the mention of Hugo’s name, Lucy remembers how Jack left Hugo with her to contact the authorities. She found him impossibly handsome when she was a 13-year-old. However, Hugo wasn’t impressed with her decision to run away from home because he had a younger brother close to her age. It earned her the nickname “Hart Attack,” and Hugo spent their time together teaching her how to draw. Before long, a police officer and social worker turned up to collect her.

Back in the present, Mikey puts her on the ferry to Clock Island. As she comes into view of the big Victorian house, she feels as if she’s 13 years old again, nervous but still in awe of the house on Clock Island.

Part 2 Analysis

Part 2 of The Wishing Game focuses on the emotional impact of Jack’s books to demonstrate how literature can both heal and liberate a person from internal trappings. The text initially illustrates this power in Hugo’s reminiscence of how he became Jack’s illustrator as a 21-year-old. At the time, Hugo was more interested in portraying himself as a serious artist than necessarily abandoning himself freely to his art. He ascribed to a specific aesthetic to show what he considered a “serious artist,” as this passage conveys through the wisdom of hindsight: “He wanted to reach back in time and shake some sense into his younger self, tell him to stop pretending to be a serious artist—all black clothes and black looks and bad attitude” (74). The pretentiousness of this assumed persona restricted Hugo, qualifying him not so much as an artist but more as a custom designer and leading him to have little confidence in himself and even give someone else free rein to his passion and artistic ability: “‘You don’t tell me how to do my art. I don’t tell you how to do your art.’ ‘Jack?’ ‘Yes, Hugo?’ ‘Tell me how to do my art’” (76).

Jack’s personal philosophy about fun and the gifts one receives doesn’t allow for such unaccountability in creating art. As he explained to Hugo when they met,

The way I see it, I have two choices. I can set that gift on a high shelf so it won’t be dinged up and nobody can make fun of me for playing with it. […] Or I can have fun with it and play with the gift I was given until the engine burns out and the wheels come off (78).

He alluded to Hugo’s favorite gift, a Batmobile toy, as a metaphor to hint at the connection between art and childlike enjoyment. Although Jack’s main concern is Hugo’s not wasting his artistic potential (placing his “gift on a high shelf” (78), so to speak), comparing his ability to a child’s favorite toy is itself revealing. For Jack, the purpose of making art is to provoke the same exuberant joy one had as a child, the same innocence, and the same devotion brought about by one’s adoration of an object or, in this case, an art form. Hugo’s insistence on being serious about his art cost him this joy, but while working on Jack’s book cover and letting himself simply have childlike fun with his abilities, he created a piece that both he and Jack approved of and loved.

The text hints that this engagement with one’s pure, childlike state also appeals to children and allows them to feel seen and understood in Jack’s works. The novel implies this connection through Christopher’s becoming verbal after his trauma because of his enjoyment of Jack’s books: “When they got to the middle, it was bedtime. When he [Christopher] asked if she [Lucy] would read one more chapter to him, those were the first words he’d said since she’d brought him to her house” (86). The death of his parents silenced Christopher, but Jack’s books renewed his curiosity and helped him overcome his self-imposed silence. Later, Christopher finds inspiration in the Mastermind—through Jack’s letters—to overcome his fear of phones. Through these scenes, the novel introduces another of its major themes: The Value of Stories. This theme is especially evident in how Jack’s works can inspire an emotional reaction from his readers that allows them to transcend their often self-made limitations and thereby experience joy again.