The Memory Keeper’s Daughter – short lived in this reader’s eyes
February 7th 2008 20:29
Well, I am about to take off on a relaxing break with a fishing rod in one hand and a stack of books in the other, and nothing could sound more inviting. A friend once told me her favourite fishing rod had no line on it. I’m considering borrowing it!
And hoping to discover some great reads on this holiday, as my last attempt was a disappointment. The Memory Keeper’s Daughter by Kim Edwards promised to impress or even enthrall me. Sadly this was not the case (we really shouldn’t let publicity hype sway us).
David Henry the infamous doctor/husband who, in a split second decision decides to tell his wife the delivered twin of their son died during childbirth because he instantly recognized that this little girl suffered Downs Syndrome, the same condition his sister was born with. He simply wanted to spare his wife the pain and wrenching agony his mother experienced, so he handed the child to his nurse and instructed her to put her in an institution. Of course, Caroline, the nurse, was captivated by the child (also in love with the doctor) and after seeing the horrid place she was to deposit the infant, could not do it, so she fled her home and lively hood to start a new life with her acquired child. Whew!
For melodramatic fiction readers this story has everything. Gut wrenching guilt, sorted secrets, passionate devotion, sex, lies … you name it. It’s all there! I have no problem with any of these themes in a book, but these characters are card board cutouts of every soap-opera that was ever penned and I ran out of patience long before the crunch came – when it was finally revealed to Norah (the mother) that her daughter was alive after all.
This book is a New York Times best seller, and I am constantly amazed at what people consider good fiction (of course everyone’s taste is their own), but to get on that list there has to be a lot of people buying this book! So, does that mean the majority of readers like this sort of (do people still use this word?) hogwash? It would appear so … in America anyway.
To give Memory Keeper’s its due, I like the whole idea of bringing Downs Syndrome into a story. There are way too many beautiful, perfect babies born into fiction. And I concede this was the 60s and views on 'retarded' children were horrendous back then, but the story did not focus on the child so much as the completely mundane and totally boring issues of the adults. The author tried (unsuccessfully in my views) to distract us from their whoa-be-gone problems, but it was trivial babble that did not reflect what these characters were doing or going through … even considering the early childhood traumas that we were made privy to.
So, I guess after all is said and done, if you want a nice, juicy, oh-my-god-how-could-he, then you’ll like this book and of course there are times when this is all we want in a read. I guess this was just not one of those times for me.
Maybe I should have saved this one for the fishing rod!
And hoping to discover some great reads on this holiday, as my last attempt was a disappointment. The Memory Keeper’s Daughter by Kim Edwards promised to impress or even enthrall me. Sadly this was not the case (we really shouldn’t let publicity hype sway us).
For melodramatic fiction readers this story has everything. Gut wrenching guilt, sorted secrets, passionate devotion, sex, lies … you name it. It’s all there! I have no problem with any of these themes in a book, but these characters are card board cutouts of every soap-opera that was ever penned and I ran out of patience long before the crunch came – when it was finally revealed to Norah (the mother) that her daughter was alive after all.
This book is a New York Times best seller, and I am constantly amazed at what people consider good fiction (of course everyone’s taste is their own), but to get on that list there has to be a lot of people buying this book! So, does that mean the majority of readers like this sort of (do people still use this word?) hogwash? It would appear so … in America anyway.
To give Memory Keeper’s its due, I like the whole idea of bringing Downs Syndrome into a story. There are way too many beautiful, perfect babies born into fiction. And I concede this was the 60s and views on 'retarded' children were horrendous back then, but the story did not focus on the child so much as the completely mundane and totally boring issues of the adults. The author tried (unsuccessfully in my views) to distract us from their whoa-be-gone problems, but it was trivial babble that did not reflect what these characters were doing or going through … even considering the early childhood traumas that we were made privy to.
So, I guess after all is said and done, if you want a nice, juicy, oh-my-god-how-could-he, then you’ll like this book and of course there are times when this is all we want in a read. I guess this was just not one of those times for me.
Maybe I should have saved this one for the fishing rod!
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