Tonight we will be discussing GLBTQ Fiction in my Reader Advisory class. Only two more discussions after this (Multicultural Fiction and Literary Fiction) and then we are done. I don't know what I'm going to fill my Wednesday's with once it is over. :-)
For tonight's class I originally sat down to read My Lucky Star by Joe Keenan, but about five pages in I realized it was part of a series. After confirming that it was the most recent book in the series, I promptly switched to my back-up book. So, the book I finally ended up reading for tonight's class was Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit by Jeanette Winterson. Adopted by a fanatically religious mother who intends to raise her to become a missionary, Jeanette knows that her life was not meant to be ordinary. Early on she tells readers, "I cannot recall a time when I did not know that I was special." Growing up in a bleak, repressive household, surrounded by her mother's Evangelical friends, Jeanette thinks her life is normal. It isn't until she gets to be a teenager and falls in love with Melanie that she begins to question what she has been taught. Her mother says that what the girls feel for each other are "Unnatural Passions," but Jeanette disagrees. Why can't she love both God and Melanie? Insightful and at times unexpectedly funny, Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit is recommend to any reader who has felt stymied by parental expectations, as well as anyone who is still trying to define who they are.
While I liked the book and thought it was very well written (it should be since in won the Whitbread Award for Best First Novel in 1985), I felt sort of ehh about the ending. I expected there to be some sort of resolution/understanding to develop between Jeanette and her mother, and there wasn't one. I can see why the author ended the book the way she did, but I think it was a real disservice to the reader to leave the characters on such a weird note. Note: spoilers ahead. After an absence of several years, Jeanette decides to visit her mother for Christmas. The last time Jeanette saw her mother she was in her teens, and their parting was quite acrimonious. Flash forward several years and Jeanette lets herself into her childhood home to find her mother playing an electronic organ in the parlour. Her mother's reaction? She acts like Jeanette had been visiting the corner grocery store and has just returned. They don't have a big discussion about the last time the saw one another. The don't talk about how unaccepting Jeanette's mother is of her lifestyle. In short, they don't have the come to Jesus meeting that I was expecting. What they do have is lots and lots of chit chat, and they generally behave as if the last few years had not happened. That was just weird to me as a reader, and a bit frustrating.
Right now I have absolutely no idea what tonight's discussion is going to be like, which has me a bit nervous. Any suggestions for questions for the class? I've got a couple in my head, but I know a couple of students in the class are bound to make me regret asking them.
posted by Kelly @ 8:48 AM
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