I wonder if any of you have read The Memory Keeper´s Daughter by Kim Edwards? What did you think of it?
I came across it last year after looking in a list of best sellers on the Waterstones website and I’m glad I did. This book is beautiful. Heartbreaking. Powerful. Wonderful. Sad. It’s an actual storm of emotions.
The book tells the story of David and Norah Henry. On a heavily snowy night in 1964 David gives birth to his own twins in his clinic. One healthy boy and an unexpected twin, a girl with Down syndrome.
On that night Dr.Henry, knowing in the 60´s that imperfect children were sent away to institutions where they died young and their families spoke of them in whispers, had also had a sister who died young due to heart failure causing pain to all those who loved her. Considering these reasons and trying to spare Norah the pain, Dr.Henry made a haste decision. He told his wife the child had died at birth and gave orders to his nurse to take the child to an institution and never tell anybody what had happened.
The nurse, Caroline after seeing the conditions at the institution is appalled and decides to bring up Phoebe on her own.
Over the next 25 years we see how David’s decision affects all, Norah mourns her baby that nobody wants to talk about, David who regrets giving her away and has to live with his decision driving the family distant, Paul who thinks he can’t live up to his father’s expectations whilst growing up in the secrets that tear his parents apart.
Meanwhile Caroline faces discrimination as she tries to get medical help for her daughter, taking us through various events that might seem outrageous to us today, but were widely held at the time the book is set.
This book is an engaging story written beautifully, making all of us feel Caroline’s pain as a mother when anybody looked at Phoebe differently. Each chapter is told from a different perspective making us understand each person’s motives, feelings and lies.
Would you have done the same as David? I think this story helps us understand David’s decision, even though we don’t agree with it. Throughout the book we begin to love this unwanted child who was denied love by those who should have loved her. Phoebe is an ordinary child with just slower abilities that people should comprehend. It helps us realise how difficult it was for a parent to bring up a child with Down syndrome in those days because they were denied education and medical help being considered mentally retarded and that they would overwhelm the education system.
Post in your opinion…
I came across it last year after looking in a list of best sellers on the Waterstones website and I’m glad I did. This book is beautiful. Heartbreaking. Powerful. Wonderful. Sad. It’s an actual storm of emotions.
The book tells the story of David and Norah Henry. On a heavily snowy night in 1964 David gives birth to his own twins in his clinic. One healthy boy and an unexpected twin, a girl with Down syndrome.
On that night Dr.Henry, knowing in the 60´s that imperfect children were sent away to institutions where they died young and their families spoke of them in whispers, had also had a sister who died young due to heart failure causing pain to all those who loved her. Considering these reasons and trying to spare Norah the pain, Dr.Henry made a haste decision. He told his wife the child had died at birth and gave orders to his nurse to take the child to an institution and never tell anybody what had happened.
The nurse, Caroline after seeing the conditions at the institution is appalled and decides to bring up Phoebe on her own.
Over the next 25 years we see how David’s decision affects all, Norah mourns her baby that nobody wants to talk about, David who regrets giving her away and has to live with his decision driving the family distant, Paul who thinks he can’t live up to his father’s expectations whilst growing up in the secrets that tear his parents apart.
Meanwhile Caroline faces discrimination as she tries to get medical help for her daughter, taking us through various events that might seem outrageous to us today, but were widely held at the time the book is set.
This book is an engaging story written beautifully, making all of us feel Caroline’s pain as a mother when anybody looked at Phoebe differently. Each chapter is told from a different perspective making us understand each person’s motives, feelings and lies.
Would you have done the same as David? I think this story helps us understand David’s decision, even though we don’t agree with it. Throughout the book we begin to love this unwanted child who was denied love by those who should have loved her. Phoebe is an ordinary child with just slower abilities that people should comprehend. It helps us realise how difficult it was for a parent to bring up a child with Down syndrome in those days because they were denied education and medical help being considered mentally retarded and that they would overwhelm the education system.
Post in your opinion…
4 comments:
You reminded me of Ursula's story, Omelas.
Although I haven't already read this story, it seems a very interesting one. I will certainly read it very soon.
Loved the review.
I understand why it makes you remember Omelas. But for those of you who don’t know The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas is a short story by Ursula K.Le Guin. It tells the story of a beautiful city full of happiness.
"Omelas sounds in my words like a city in a fairy tale, long ago and far away, once upon a time (...) this follows from the fact that the people of Omelas are happy people. Happiness is based on just discrimination of what is necessary...". This necessary discrimination lies in a cellar in a basement in Omelas. It is a child locked up in the worst conditions, naked and dirty. "It is naked. Its buttocks and thighs are a mass of festered sores, as it sits in its own excrement continually".
This is because the people of Omelas believe that all the beauty and happiness of the city depends on the incarceration of this child. The main question here is whether to throw away the happiness of thousands
for the chance of happiness of one. Maybe that’s where the two stories are alike, because David also gives away his daughter in hope to spare his family the pain, in other words keep them happy.
Le Guin tries to persuade us that happiness is sacred and worthy of sacrifice. So at the end of the story we question ourselves to what extent would we give up something to be really happy. Both stories end up being a puzzle of moral values.
Once upon a time, it is said, 'primitive' societies understood that there were certain people amongst them who were touched by G/god, and so they held such people in esteem and treated them accordingly and witnessed divine things and felt blessed beyond belief. Today, it is a poor and impoverished person who turns his/her back on the meaning of life, understanding and happiness, for you need only look around you to enact, witness and experience the effects of this ancient wisdom and live happy ever after... although, I guarantee, you will be moved to tears! (I am thinking of people such as Geri Jewell and Mattie S. ).
Post a Comment