MY SISTER'S KEEPER by Jodi Picoult
Most novelists start out with their big novel and then slowly fade from sight. A smaller number have a couple of hits before they vanish. And some lucky few write books of value time after time after time. Such a writer is Jodi Picoult. She has been writing novels for a few years now and each one gets better and better. Her latest, MY SISTER'S KEEPER, is her best effort yet.
This book tells the story of Anna Fitzgerald, a thirteen-year-old girl whose older sister Kate suffers from a form of leukemia. Her parents, Sara and Brian, actually conceived Anna as a means to save Kate's life. Throughout her thirteen years there has been one medical crises after another which have required Anna to give up bone marrow, blood cells, etc. in order to preserve and prolong Kate's life.
Now Kate's kidneys are failing and Anna is told she needs to donate one of her kidneys to help Kate survive. It is at this point that Anna contacts an attorney, Campbell Alexander, and asks him to help her sue her parents. She wants the courts to prevent them from taking her kidney.
On the surface this sounds like ghoulish and sensational story material, but in the hands of Picoult it is a poignant and tragic story of a parent fighting to save one child at the expense of another. Sara Fitzgerald has only good intent in demanding sacrifices on Anna's part, but even her husband Brian finally sees it as being too much.
In writing this story Picoult adopts the method of giving each major character a voice. Various chapters are written from the first person standpoint of Anna, Sara, Brian, Campbell, Anna's brother Jesse, and Julia the person appointed by the court to look after Anna's interests. Each is distinctive in viewpoint and each has a unique approach to the overall story.
This manner of writing could be a fiasco in the hands of a less talented author. These six people are dissimilar yet each is pertinent to the overall effect of the story. Each has weaknesses and strengths; each has hopes and disappointments. You get to know them all, and you get to like them all.
This is a story that can lay claim to the "torn from today's headlines" hype. It truly is. Situations such as Anna's have become more common, and this adds to the dramatic impact of the book.
Once you start this novel you will be immediately drawn into Anna's world, and when the book has ended you will wish there had been more. It is that involving, that well written, that emotionally compelling. It is Picoult's best book yet and when she is good she is very, very good.
MY SISTER'S KEEPER is published by Atria Books. It contains 423 pages and sells for $25.00.