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1-Page Summary of Extraordinary Means
Overall Summary
Extraordinary Means is a novel about teenagers who are diagnosed with tuberculosis and sent to Latham House, a sanitorium where they’re quarantined from the rest of society. There, they meet Sadie, another teenager also suffering from TB. They form friendships with each other while undergoing experimental treatments for their condition. The story explores themes of mortality and what really matters in life as these kids grapple with their illness.
Extraordinary Means is about a boy named Lane Rosen who has it all planned out: he’s going to go to an elite college, become wealthy, and live happily ever after. But when he gets diagnosed with TDR-TB (a rare form of tuberculosis), his life changes drastically. He goes into Latham House, a sanitarium in the Santa Cruz mountains that houses other teens with TB. It’s there where he meets Nick Patel, another teen at the facility who becomes his first friend; along with Sadie Scott, whom they met at summer camp years ago but hasn’t talked to since then because she didn’t care about following rules back then.
Lane is examined by Dr. Barons, who warns him about two lesions on his right lung and puts him on a strict schedule to keep him healthy and relaxed. Lane decides to largely ignore this advice because he wants to graduate in time so that he can get into the college of his choice, not really accepting how serious this is. Sadie has been at Latham House since she was a sophomore and passed out in gym class one day. At her old school she was a loner, but at Latham House she’s become close friends with Nick, Marina and Charlie; they’ve made her feel like part of their group despite being new there. She remembers Lane from camp when they were younger; it’s clear that he doesn’t remember her as well as she’d hoped for or expected after all these years (she thought maybe they could be friends). He approaches her anyway while trying hard to be nice like he used to be before camp happened (even though it wasn’t entirely his fault), but Sadie resists getting too close because at the aforementioned summer camp prank by popular girls made her think Lane had asked her out on a date only for them to let her show up alone without warning where everyone laughed at her behind closed doors during the dance night that would have been special if someone else had asked you instead. It also happens around the same time as when Sadie’s parents are divorcing which makes things difficult for both herself and Mom, so it’s better if no one knows about what happened back then.
Lane is confused about why Sadie treats him so badly. He talks to his girlfriend Hannah and learns that she thinks he’s not as sick as she is, even though Lane has a drug-resistant strain of the illness and will die if he takes the standard drugs. Lane also finds it difficult to make friends at Latham House, but when Sadie breaks a rule with her friends, he helps them without her knowing it. When Sadie refuses to thank him for saving her from getting caught breaking the rules, Lane confronts her about what she has against him. She tells him that she thought someone was writing notes on how beautiful she was in class just for Lane to see; however, after talking with Lane and realizing there wasn’t any notes written for him specifically, Sadie realizes it wasn’t meant for anyone in particular—she just assumed that because no one else would have done something like that out of kindness or pity towards another person who they didn’t know well enough yet.
The next day, Lane wakes up feeling sick. He breaks up with Hannah after a fight about her college essay, which is about him and his cancer. Sadie sees that he’s miserable and comes over to talk with him. They bond over their mutual situation. Lane begins to get worse health-wise, and Dr. Barons tells him he needs to relax instead of trying to keep up at schoolwork or it’ll kill him faster than the cancer will alone. Lane agrees and becomes part of Sadie’s group of friends as they break rules together in order to have fun for once, but then starts having fun for real when he realizes that breaking the rules isn’t so bad if you’re doing it with people you like (i.e., Sadie). Then Dr. Barons informs them both that there may be an experimental treatment available soon if his health stays stable until then; they are hopeful since his recent improvement has been excellent thus far.
