Ma vie pour la tienne

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 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!

I'm not a fan of Picoult's writing style, but the subject matter in this book was intriguing and thought-provoking. Sixteen-year-old Kate was born with a very rare form of leukemia, and her mother is so determined to beat this disease that she and her husband conceive Anna, a "designer baby" genetically engineered to be a donor for Kate. So far, the 13-year-old Anna has donated platelets, blood, her umbilical cord, bone marrow, and now it's assumed that she will donate one of her kidneys in a last effort to save her sister's life. This is what Anna was conceived to do, but instead, she hires a lawyer in an effort to gain control over her body. I'll stop telling the story right there, but will point out that this novel makes some very real observations about what a serious illness can do to a family: the oldest child in this story is a boy in his late teens whose life has taken a bad turn due to the stress and neglect that has been his lot in life, Anna and her father are also stressed emotionally torn, and Kate's life is hell. This illness is all-consuming and very sad. The characters will not stay in your mind very long, because they're not very well developed, but the storyline will. It's certainly something to ponder. The ending was unexpected and I personally thought it was a cope out. Just sayin'