Introduction (early in reading)

Pages read so far: 1-143

I think cancer has affected us all one way or another. After a recent death in my family due to lung cancer, I thought My Sister’s Keeper by Jodi Picoult would be an interesting book that I could connect to personally. Of course, my family wishes we could have saved my aunt and could have done more to help her in the painful process. However, in the book My Sister’s Keeper 13-year-old Anna Fitzgerald wants to stop helping her older sister Kate who has acute promyelocytic leukemia. Anna doesn't care if her sister dies.

Now, I’m sure you’re saying, “Why on earth would a girl want that for her sister?” That was my first question too when I first began reading this book. (As much as my sister annoys me, I would never want her to die!) But Anna’s parents, Sara who's a lawyer and Brian who's a fire fighter, consulted a doctor to create a specific combination of precious genetic material to make sure their new baby (Anna) would be an allogeneic donor- the perfect bone marrow match for Kate. Sara and Brian have a son, who's older than Kate, but he wasn't a match for Kate. Therefore, from the moment Anna was born, she was in and out of the hospital not because she was sick; but because she was forced to help her sister by giving her leukocytes, stem cells or bone marrow. In the first chapter, Anna tells us how she never agreed to help Kate; and she’s getting fed up with not having the right to say no to her parents. She feels left out of her family and forgotten until Kate needs blood or bone marrow. She feels like the only reason she was conceived was because Kate needed a sibling with a perfect bone marrow match. Anna wonders if Kate hadn't been sick, if she would even be alive. 

Anna finally realizes that enough is enough so, with the little money that she has, she goes to a lawyer named Campbell Alexander. She tells him that she wants to sue her parents for the rights to her own body. Of course, Campbell thinks she’s absolutely ridiculous.

"'What happens if you don't give your sister a kidney?'

'She'll die.'

'And you're okay with this?'

'I'm here aren't I?'

'Yes, you are. I'm just trying to figure out what made you want to put your foot down, after all this time.'

She looks over at the bookshelf. 'Because,' she says simply. 'It never stops' (Picoult 22).

As soon as Anna’s parents, Sara and Brian, find out that their own daughter is suing them, they’re immediately confused and hurt. Sara, who is a lawyer, says, "do you even realize what the consequences will be?” (Picoult 54). And with that, Sara slaps Anna hard.

Before long, Sara is trying to talk Anna out of going through with the lawsuit. She thinks Anna's just trying to get attention. Anna decides to take a break from her home, so she moves into the firestation where her dad sleeps if he's on call. Soon Campbell, Anna, Sara and Brian meet with Judge DeSalvo. Judge DeSalvo so far seems to be fair, and he looks out for Anna's best interests so he appoints a guardian ad litem to spend two weeks with her. The appointed guardian ad litem is Julia Romano, who lives with her lesbien sister named Izzy. It turns out that Julia and Campbell had a relationship back 15 years ago when they both attended Wheeler School. Julia wasn't popular at all; she wore combat boots and had pink hair. Campbell was the captain of the sailing team, all the girls loved him and was from a weathly family. Campbell's parents didn't approve of Julia at all, because she wasn't 'one of them'. So far, there's a lot of tension between these two because of their past relationship, but I feel we're about to reach the climax of Julia and Campbell's new, budding relationship together.

On page 93, Jesse Fitzgerald, Sara and Brian's oldest child, narrates his first chapter. Up till now, Jesse hasn't been mentioned much except for a brief description at the beginning of the book. He's described as a kid who isn't going down the right road in life. He smokes, likes to play with fire, enjoys magazines filled with porn, takes drugs, drinks all the time and is an all-around rebel. However, Jesse loves both his sisters very much. In Jesse's chapter he meets up with Dan, a homeless dude, who watches Jesse's stuff' in return for a ValueMeal at McDonald's. After Jesse drops his stuff off with Dan, he goes to an empty warehouse and lights it on fire, which ironically, Brian is called to come put out. Jodi Picoult didn't explain Jesse's reasoning for lighting the warehouse on fire.

I’m happy that in each new chapter, a new person narrates it. So far, Anna, Sara, Brian, Jesse, Julia and Campbell  have narrated their own chapters, each expressing their thoughts and frusterations about the situation they’re involved in. Also, in some chapters, it switches years. For example, most of the chapters Sara narrates are back in the 90's when Kate is first diagnosed with leukemia, when Brian and her consult the doctor to make sure their new baby will be the perfect match for Kate, when Brian and her go on TV to talk about the unique way Anna was conceived and when they are accused of creating a 'model baby'. One thing I found interesting about Sara's chapters is that they're based around Kate and only Kate. She rarely talks about her other two children, but just the fact that she will do everything to make Kate well again.

So far I’m impressed with how this book is written. It’s exciting and I literally can't put it down! I've been reading it every spare second I can get! Most of the chapters have a cliff-ending, which makes me want to continue to read and read. It conveys the emotions of any family dealing with cancer, which is something I can easily relate to, which makes it even more interesting for me. Hopefully My Sister’s Keeper continues to be a good read!!!!