A Walk to Remember

Jamie’s secret for the greatest part of the novel is that she is dying of leukemia. While she confesses the truth to Landon at the end of Chapter 11, there are many textual clues prior to this reveal, such as when Jamie confesses that she desperately wants the play to be the best ever this year, and when she gives Landon her Bible, which is her most prized possession. Jamie’s wish to get married before a packed congregation reflects her desire to come of age before her premature death. In Jamie’s case, her foray into sexuality and womanhood seems especially brief given that Landon is the first boy she has kissed. She’s also retained the same asexual, childlike appearance, where she goes “without a stitch of makeup” and wears “her usual brown cardigan and plaid skirt” (16) all the way through high school. Her entrance into the realm of sexual interest is rendered through Landon’s male gaze on the “two new bumps on her chest” (19) at the beginning of senior year, and the way she “smiled right at” him. With “a mischievous gleam in her eye” (155), a dying Jamie confesses to Landon that she knew that he would fall in love with her, although she is vague about the reasons for her certainty.