Wish You Well

Oz is Lou’s seven-year-old brother. Imaginative and easily frightened, Oz believes in magic and hopes to use a wishing well to bring his mother back to health. Although Lou frequently protects Oz from bullies, he eventually learns to fight his own battles. Oz teaches Lou how to recognize the importance of faith and gives Lou a purpose when she feels her family has all been taken away. He functions as a kind of child-like spirit guide, in that he follows faith when Lou is initially only reliant on facts.

Louisa, Oz and Lou’s paternal grandmother, is in her eighties. She has a strong temperament that has allowed her to survive the hardships of mountain life. The old woman helped raise Jack and also takes in his two children after his death. She teaches them to love the mountain as much as she does. Louisa sees the rugged terrain as a part of her family that will never leave. Although she doesn’t survive her stroke, Louisa’s descendants preserve her legacy by keeping the farm.

Louisa functions as the absolute good in the story, as she has little to give and is still charitable toward her neighbors, she considers it her moral obligation to protect the land and the mountain, and she has raised multiple orphans. Like Oz, she encourages Lou to have faith and instills a love for the mountains and hard work in the children. 

Jack is Louisa’s grandson and the father of Lou and Oz. He left the mountain as a youth to pursue a writing career in New York, at Louisa’s encouragement. Although Jack’s work is critically acclaimed, it never succeeds commercially. He is on the point of accepting a job in Hollywood when he dies in a car crash. Through his writing, he imparts his love of the high rock to his children. 

Amanda is Jack’s wife and the mother of Lou and Oz. Right before the accident, she tries to persuade Jack to return to his roots in the mountains. After her husband dies, she falls into a catatonic state and doesn’t revive until the very end of the story. Amanda carries on Louisa’s legacy and raises her children on the farm she inherits from the old woman.

Though Amanda doesn’t speak or interact with the other characters through much of the novel, she functions as a symbol of hope for Lou. At first, Lou considers her a lost cause and doesn’t bother reading to her or hoping for her recovery. After she begins to emotionally heal while living with Louisa, Lou’s hope returns, and she wishes for Amanda’s recovery at the wishing well and begins reading to her. Lou’s treatment of Amanda traces Lou’s character development. 

Cotton is a transplanted Bostonian who came west to avoid living in the shadow of his famous ancestor. Happy as a country lawyer, Cotton is a good friend and neighbor to Louisa. He takes an interest in the plight of the children and reads to Amanda in hopes of bringing her back to life. He eventually weds her and helps raise Lou and Oz on the farm that Louisa left to her descendants.

Eugene is a lame black man whom Louisa raised after his parents died. He helps her run the farm and teaches Lou and Oz the various chores necessary to provide for their survival. Protective of Louisa to the very end, Eugene eventually marries and raises a family of his own on the mountain. 

Diamond is a loquacious mountain boy who befriends Lou and Oz. He delights in telling tall tales about magic wishing wells. Diamond’s parents are dead, so he shifts for himself, though Louisa frequently includes him in the family circle. Diamond dies in a mine explosion while trying to rescue his dog. Lou realizes after Diamond’s death that she still has her mother, and she decides to try to help her mother heal. While Diamond’s death devastates Lou, it helps her to appreciate the family she has left; Diamond functions as a cautionary tale. 

George is Louisa’s ill-tempered neighbor. Although he is a prosperous landowner, he abuses and starves his family in order to hoard every penny. He tries to force Louisa to sell to the gas company so that he, too, can receive a lucrative sales offer. Although it can’t be proven, George probably set fire to Louisa’s barn. His scheme to sell his property fails when Amanda takes control of Louisa’s land.

George functions as the absolute antagonist in the novel. He has no redeeming qualities and is selfish and destructive, despite the help Louisa has given his family.