500 pages
English language
Published June 10, 2009 by Pocket Books.
Conceived to provide a bone marrow match for her leukemia-stricken sister, teenage Kate begins to question her moral obligations in light of countless medical procedures and decides to fight for the right to make decisions about her own body.
This was an engaging read for me. I had a hard time putting the book down because I wanted to see what was going to happen next.
I never watched the movie, so I had no idea what I was getting into with this one.
I can definitely understand why some people do not like this book at all. But I found it to be engaging enough that I wasn't bothered by a lot of the gripes others have had.
I borrowed My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult from my own sister who said it was a very emotional book. Picoult delves into the ethical and moral minefields caused by creating genetically designed babies. The youngest daughter of her imagined Fitzgerald family, Anna, was conceived solely in order to provide 'spare parts' for elder sister Kate who is dying from leukaemia. However, by the time she turns thirteen, Anna is fed up with repeated hospital visits and invasive operations so takes out a lawsuit to prevent any more of her body being harvested for Kate's benefit. The ensuing arguments threaten to tear the whole family apart.
Family members take turns narrating chapters throughout the novel so the story unravels from multiple perspectives. Unfortunately everyone speaks remarkably similarly so I often lost track of whose chapter I was reading. Picoult's prose is very manipulative too. This is an incredibly emotionally charged …
I borrowed My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult from my own sister who said it was a very emotional book. Picoult delves into the ethical and moral minefields caused by creating genetically designed babies. The youngest daughter of her imagined Fitzgerald family, Anna, was conceived solely in order to provide 'spare parts' for elder sister Kate who is dying from leukaemia. However, by the time she turns thirteen, Anna is fed up with repeated hospital visits and invasive operations so takes out a lawsuit to prevent any more of her body being harvested for Kate's benefit. The ensuing arguments threaten to tear the whole family apart.
Family members take turns narrating chapters throughout the novel so the story unravels from multiple perspectives. Unfortunately everyone speaks remarkably similarly so I often lost track of whose chapter I was reading. Picoult's prose is very manipulative too. This is an incredibly emotionally charged subject, but as readers we are subjected to extra tugs through plot devices such as the father's career as a heroic firefighter - at one point he really does rush into an inferno to rescue a toddler. Anna's completely unprofessional legal team seem to spend more time resurrecting their abruptly halted college romance than fighting for her rights - the pair hadn't seen each other for fifteen years until they just happened to be thrown together for this one case. And of course, Anna's mother used to be a hotshot lawyer herself until she sacrificed her career for her children.
Her Sister's Keeper could and should have been an excellent novel confronting a hugely important contemporary issue. However I found it mawkish and frequently so sentimental as to be nauseating! There is a good story underneath, but it needs far stronger characters and greater subtlety with those emotional hammers to be convincing. Oh, and don't read the last chapter. Stop when the court case finishes because the real ending is just dire!
Another moving and controversial story from Jodi Picoult, however I did find it hard to follow the timeline in places as it wasn't so clear as her other books whether we were in the past or present. Anna is a fantastic character and if it was just her story it would be 5 stars! I'm only giving it 3 stars as I found it a little long and the end seemed to be tacked on as an after-thought - to me it didn't seem a logical or believable conclusion to the story. I don't think we really needed the lawyer/GAL romance and whilst I had sympathy for Sara I didn't like her much.
