Chapters 36-54
Can I start this recap by saying that it is not necessary for any book of this ilk to have this many chapters?? Anyway, I digress. Jane and Rebecca see a demolition, that's a whole chapter. I can't even explain the point of this...is it a metaphor? A whacky road trip adventure? Why is this here? Joley, creeper brother supreme and he of the very poorly thought out logic, writes Jane and Rebecca to tell them that they have to go back to the spot where the plan crashed when Rebecca was three. Furthermore, he claims that she survived the plane crash because at that time Jane and Joley (brrr) had been arguing about her on the phone and only souls that are at peace can go to heaven. Riiiiight. Then Jane recounts how she was sexually abused as a child. Of course she was, sexual abuse is the only way to give a character depth, right? Jane and Rebecca do go to the sight of the plane crash and they have many emotions. Yay for emotions! Meanwhile, Oliver, creeper dad supreme watches from his lawn chair. You see he caught up with them but can't bring himself to talk to them. Basically, as I said last time each section is pretty much the same. Joley writes creepy letters, Oliver tries to be nice but just ends up seeming deluded-I love my wife and all but WHALES ARE BETTER! Jane and Rebecca have fun road trip adventures. This time Jane also writes a letter to Joley saying that she was sexually abused but due to her chronic inability to do anything useful, she rips it up. Argh, They go to an aquarium. Oliver reminisces to a waitress about how sad his life is and how he fucked everything up and instead of telling him "damn right you did" she takes him to his house, where he has suddenly fallen ill and nurtures him back to heath. Yay for clichés!
Once again we cover the meeting of Sam and Jane. In case we didn't get this point already, they didn't like each other, Jane is a city girl with an expensive education and Sam is an agile
simpleton farmer. (Note: I grew up on a farm, I do not think farmers are simpletons, but this book clearly does!) The end (I wish.) Joley really loves working on the orchard. Here is a quote from him:
"Look at the place, Jane! It's like God just dropped down this gorgeous hill and lake, and I have the good fortune to work here. If you can call this work. I fix the unfixable. I bring trees back from the dead." He looks into my eyes. "I've become mythic. The god of second chances." What kind of pompous arse refers to himself as a god?! Anyway, the point is Joley's purpose in life is to give Jane a second chance because, that's what brothers are for...? I also think this book needs to rethink it's definition of abuse. Not that I don't take abuse seriously but I think one slap in 25 years of marriage, while bad, doesn't necessarily get to be called abuse. Or do you disagree readers? Anyway, Jane and Sam have an unfortunate run-in in the bathroom. Have you ever watched a sitcom? Then you get the gist. Meanwhile Joley confronts Jane with the facts about her situation. Basically she has to make a decision and he knows what it should be. Of course he does. Hadley seduces Rebecca with his impressive knowledge of cow digestion. Sam prefers another technique...once he finally realises that he's in love with Jane (or whatever) they go fishing. Oliver recovers from his mini coma and is about to go get Jane when suddenly he sees, on the news, that a whale is trapped and decides he must go save it. I won't lie, this was absolutely my favourite part of the book. This guy is such an idiot that he thinks that going to save a whale will help him woo back his wife, even when, his whale oriented career is what got him into this mess in the first place, not to mention the fact that we've already hear about how Jane doesn't give two craps about whales. Solid plan, Oliver, solid plan. Not to mention that at this point the writing feels so manipulative. I mean, we are supposed to believe that Oliver and Jane were once in love, but Picoult just makes Oliver seem like a tool. The problem is that, there should be something at stake for Jane, she should have a hard time choosing between the two men if there's going to be drama in the book but the book just makes it so obvious whose side Picoult is on. Anyway, that is where this section leaves off. Considering this is Jodi Picoult's first novel maybe I shouldn't be so hard on it?
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