It's been days since I finished reading this book and I find I'm still thinking about it. The writing was wonderful, the story bizarre. I've finally decided that Janet Fitch is a female John Irving and wrote a sympathetic character in a story set on the fine line between reality and fantasy. After I finished reading The World According to Garp, I remember feeling like I had just had my leg pulled and I had the feeling after I finished this.
A friend called the book an endictment against the foster system in California. However, the foster homes in this book lacked standards required for licensing. I almost felt guilty when I laughed as the homes each got worse and more pathetic, with the last one openly using drugs and having no demonstrable source income outside of the foster children and scrounging at flea markets. It was like, now what??
I always injoy good writing and an original story, as in The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. I am reminded why a fiction book is called a novel. I will read this author again.
1 comment:
Both my adult DD and I read this book several years ago, and I agree, it is haunting. The foster system is both that bad and so much better, but underlying that is the issue that the character made what she could of what happened to her, and somehow rose above the craziness.
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