Why I Hate My Sister’s Keeper

Spoilers!
         
So, yesterday I finished reading My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult. I was very disappointed.  

          Jodi Picoult’s only real talent is coming up with controversial plots. Since her reader is so amazed with what genius ideas she has for the basis of her books, the reader will automatically assume that what is inside the books is just as life-changing as the little blurb on the back cover promises. In the beginning, My Sister’s Keeper  seemed like it would indeed be an improvement on her previous book I had read, Nineteen Minutes, which it was. (I thought Nineteen Minutes would be a legal drama whose plot would have more body than a soap opera and whose villain would have a little more clout than a teletubby. Needless to say, my dreams for that book were smashed the moment the first chapter was finally over).

            But on to My Sister’s Keeper. The basic plot is that a typical white suburban family has a son, Jesse (who later turns out to be a trouble maker as he is not a bone marrow match for his sister, Kate), a daughter Kate, who is diagnosed with a rare form of Leukemia at a young age, and a second daughter, Anna, who was genetically conceived as a bone marrow match for Kate to keep her alive and later sues her family for the right to her own body at age thirteen. Drama ensues involving the family and those who come into contact with them. Very little time is spent on the actual trial, so if you were expecting a legal drama, you will be very disappointed. I knew the plot of the book (more or less) because I’d watched the preview for the movie (directed by Nick Cassavetes, also director of The Notebook). After deciding to read the book first (a decision I have never regretted), I felt very proud of myself. I turned to the first page, and wham. One of the few things that automatically turns me off of a book is narration in the present tense. It seems to be a growing trend among today’s writers, notably in The Hunger Games, Jane Eyre, and The Time Traveler’s Wife. It seems that authors frequently use it in order to add intensity to the situation, and it does work sometimes. Witness a few select chapters from Angela’s Ashes by Frank McCourt. However, if the author finds him or herself needing to say things like “I can’t hide in the cafeteria” or “I have all these good intentions” in order to keep the reader interested, there is clearly a problem with the story. However, I was able to ignore the present tense most of the way through the book without letting it bother me.

            Let me just say, Jodi Picoult is not without talent. The Story of My Sister’s Keeper is truly moving, and the characters are not as shallow and generic as those of Nineteen Minutes. The scene in which the mother, Sara, sees the first symptoms of Kate’s leukemia is terrifying, as Kate’s bruises resemble “a line of little blue jewels”. This evokes a sense of impending which continues throughout most of the novel. I was not even bothered by the fact that the author knew nothing about the legal system. The inevitable soapy sub-plots eventually start to creep up: Anna’s guardian ad-litem had a high school romance with Anna’s lawyer, who ended the relationship (it seems) because he is a jerk with no respect for women. However, this is also bearable, as the plot skips around enough so that we as readers don’t get too bored of any one story line.

            Another of Jodi Picoult’s annoying habits creeps up in this  book an awful lot. Anna’s father named her after Andromeda, a goddess who was chained to a rock as a sacrifice but was later rescued. The girl who lives to be a living organ back for her sister is named after a woman who was made into a sacrifice. The metaphors in this book are laid on so thickly that each twist in the plot (except for Picoult’s signature mountain of plot twists at the end of the book) seems inevitable. So inevitable, in fact, that it is amusing that all the characters didn’t see all of it coming.

            Finally, another of one of the author’s flaws as a writer emerges at the end of My Sister’s Keeper. Until the final chapters we are presented with genuinely flawed, complex characters. Anna is a teenage girl who wants to have her own independent life even at the cost of her sister’s. Campbell Alexander, (Anna’s lawyer) is a misogynistic jerk who refuses to stay with the woman whom he loves and who has grown attached to him. At the end, everything changes: Anna did not refuse to donate parts of her body to her sister because she wanted to have her own life—she did it because her sister, who was tired of living under the constant shadow of death, told her to. Campbell Alexander abandoned the love of his life not because he did not want to deal with commitment and a less stable life, but because he had epilepsy and didn’t want her to know about it. Jodi Picoult does not seem to see that characters can be sympathetic without being angelic. A reader can adore a flawed protagonist because of his or her depth of character, not just because they are good at heart.

           So, by way of a conclusion: read this book if you love other books by Jodi Picoult. They're all rather similar anyway. If you've seen the movie: Jodi Picoult's website says that the ending has been changed from the ending in the book.