White Oleander
Genre: Fiction
I gave this book ***
This is the story of Astrid Magnussen, a twelve-year-old girl living in Los Angeles with Ingrid, her mother. Ingrid is smart, free-spirited, self-involved and manipulative, but because of her beauty she gets away with much of her antics. Astrid and Ingrid have traveled all over the world and lived, pretty much, hand to mouth and on the generosity of the men they’ve met along the way. While in Los Angeles, Ingrid meets Barry, falls in love and when he cruelly dumps her, she kills him. As Ingrid goes off to jail, Astrid is turned over to the foster care system. It is hard to say which was the worst in the succession of homes (and I use the terms loosely) in which Astrid lands. It is almost as though she is a magnet for the needy, abusive, mentally unstable women (and men) who are supposed to care for her. She encounters, drugs, sex, prostitution and suicide, but her one saving grace is her art. In almost every home she finds an artistic outlet that is somewhat distracting. Asrid’s interactions with Ingrid are limited and done mostly through letters. Ingrid is abusive and manipulative in her letters, just as much as she was in person. When Astrid turns 18, she leaves the system and cuts off all contact with her mom. But will the magnetic pull Ingrid has over Astrid lead Astrid to return to her? You’ll need to read the story to find out.
This is a true saga. About half way through the book the story just felt overwhelmingly sad. But, the writing was very good and characters so very well developed that I kept going. The language was sometimes overly descriptive, but it all felt like it was meant to be a part of this story-telling experience. This sad story of changing homes, encountering the dregs of society, looking for an anchor in people who cannot give that, I’m sure, is the life story of many children in the foster care system and so I was overwhelmed by the thought of that. It’s hard to say that I enjoyed this book, but this one will stay with me for a while. This was an intriguing view into the world of foster care, relationships between mothers and daughters and our seemingly constant search for beauty in ourselves and others.