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elenajohansen 's review for:
White Oleander
by Janet Fitch
Strongly mixed feelings that are going to take a lot of unpacking, so bear with me, this is going to be long.
Pro: a "literary" novel by a woman, concerned solely and entirely about women's lives, especially re: mother-daughter relationships. Even twenty years later, we still need more of these and less of Old White Men writing Old White Men stories.
Con: filled with ambiguous stances on problematic issues. The presence or absence of racism in the book is so complex I can't parse it, as a white person--some characters are unabashedly racist, and Astrid doesn't think she's one by comparison. Yet one of her mother figures is black, and also a prostitute...but her white mother figures aren't depicted as morally superior because of that, they're all flawed in their own ways, so maybe it's a wash? And then the dual symbolism imposed on the color white, on whiteness itself--beauty and death--carries its own racist underpinnings. I'm aware that I'm no scholar of racism in literature, so I'm not best qualified to really unravel this, but I couldn't help but be both aware of it and made uncomfortable by it.
Then, there's the sex. On the one hand, this novel acknowledges the desires of teenage girls to explore their sexuality, to even have sexuality in the first place and not be pure precious snowflakes, which I'd argue is good; but it's debatable whether or not Fitch does enough to really portray pedophilia as immoral. Astrid's relationship with Ray is one of her best memories for a time, something she longs for, even though they both knew it it was wrong; Ray is depicted in an incredibly sad, sympathetic light as a kindly man who knows his attraction isn't healthy but is so unappreciated by his actual, adult girlfriend that it's okay he's screwing a fourteen-year-old girl. And then a slightly older Astrid goes down the same path with Sergei, though it's not an innocent or idolized fairy tale of love this time, sleeping with a) an adult man who is also b) her foster mother's boyfriend. I can't make the argument here which causes me to abandon so many other works (usually by male authors, often "classics,") that the pedophilia is normalized or even glorified. It's not. But I don't know that it's condemned, either, as it should be. I don't think Fitch is wrong to write Astrid as a troubled girl with a complex relationship with sex, but I do think it could have been clearer than Ray and Sergei were in the wrong and taking advantage of her.
Pro: Ingrid is unabashedly evil, and that's just fun. How often do female characters get to be this narcissistic, this arrogant, this villainous, without restraint? And while I haven't seen the movie, I enjoyed picturing Michelle Pfeiffer as Ingrid, hearing her voice delivering those acid-etched words.
Con: By contrast, Astrid spends most of the book coming off as insipid or downright bland. I understand this, to an extent--this is her journey, and she needs to find herself, so she can't be fully formed to begin with. If her mother weren't such a blazing light, I don't think Astrid would be in as much shadow, but I do think it's an issue when the protagonist isn't nearly as captivating as the villain.
Pro: Some of the language was beautiful and memorable.
Con: Some of the language was overdone and ridiculous. (I know the appreciation of linguistic style is a matter of personal taste, but I experienced both the good and bad extremes over the course of this novel. I cringed at a line nearly as often as I stopped to be transported by one.)
Final pro: I always enjoy books that display appreciation for art. Ingrid is a poet, and while her style isn't precisely to my taste, I didn't hate her poetry, either. A major thread in Astrid's journey is finding herself through her art, and while the ending fell a little flat for me in most respects, I was enthralled by the depiction of her salvaged-goods, mixed media pieces. That's my jam, I cut things up and slap them back together differently, I made things out of other things, I get that. I knew Astrid better then, than I did for the entire rest of the book.
Pro: a "literary" novel by a woman, concerned solely and entirely about women's lives, especially re: mother-daughter relationships. Even twenty years later, we still need more of these and less of Old White Men writing Old White Men stories.
Con: filled with ambiguous stances on problematic issues. The presence or absence of racism in the book is so complex I can't parse it, as a white person--some characters are unabashedly racist, and Astrid doesn't think she's one by comparison. Yet one of her mother figures is black, and also a prostitute...but her white mother figures aren't depicted as morally superior because of that, they're all flawed in their own ways, so maybe it's a wash? And then the dual symbolism imposed on the color white, on whiteness itself--beauty and death--carries its own racist underpinnings. I'm aware that I'm no scholar of racism in literature, so I'm not best qualified to really unravel this, but I couldn't help but be both aware of it and made uncomfortable by it.
Then, there's the sex. On the one hand, this novel acknowledges the desires of teenage girls to explore their sexuality, to even have sexuality in the first place and not be pure precious snowflakes, which I'd argue is good; but it's debatable whether or not Fitch does enough to really portray pedophilia as immoral. Astrid's relationship with Ray is one of her best memories for a time, something she longs for, even though they both knew it it was wrong; Ray is depicted in an incredibly sad, sympathetic light as a kindly man who knows his attraction isn't healthy but is so unappreciated by his actual, adult girlfriend that it's okay he's screwing a fourteen-year-old girl. And then a slightly older Astrid goes down the same path with Sergei, though it's not an innocent or idolized fairy tale of love this time, sleeping with a) an adult man who is also b) her foster mother's boyfriend. I can't make the argument here which causes me to abandon so many other works (usually by male authors, often "classics,") that the pedophilia is normalized or even glorified. It's not. But I don't know that it's condemned, either, as it should be. I don't think Fitch is wrong to write Astrid as a troubled girl with a complex relationship with sex, but I do think it could have been clearer than Ray and Sergei were in the wrong and taking advantage of her.
Pro: Ingrid is unabashedly evil, and that's just fun. How often do female characters get to be this narcissistic, this arrogant, this villainous, without restraint? And while I haven't seen the movie, I enjoyed picturing Michelle Pfeiffer as Ingrid, hearing her voice delivering those acid-etched words.
Con: By contrast, Astrid spends most of the book coming off as insipid or downright bland. I understand this, to an extent--this is her journey, and she needs to find herself, so she can't be fully formed to begin with. If her mother weren't such a blazing light, I don't think Astrid would be in as much shadow, but I do think it's an issue when the protagonist isn't nearly as captivating as the villain.
Pro: Some of the language was beautiful and memorable.
Con: Some of the language was overdone and ridiculous. (I know the appreciation of linguistic style is a matter of personal taste, but I experienced both the good and bad extremes over the course of this novel. I cringed at a line nearly as often as I stopped to be transported by one.)
Final pro: I always enjoy books that display appreciation for art. Ingrid is a poet, and while her style isn't precisely to my taste, I didn't hate her poetry, either. A major thread in Astrid's journey is finding herself through her art, and while the ending fell a little flat for me in most respects, I was enthralled by the depiction of her salvaged-goods, mixed media pieces. That's my jam, I cut things up and slap them back together differently, I made things out of other things, I get that. I knew Astrid better then, than I did for the entire rest of the book.