Songs of the Humpback Whale-Part Four

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Chapters 55-72
Yaaay, we have finally reached the last section of this tripe. Joley continues his barrage of creepy incestuousness love for his sister, whining "I have believed in Jane for so long, and I have loved her so. I could never find anyone that measured up to her, which is why I've kept from marrying. What is the point of love unless I can have the ideal? " Sam and Jane fall more in love, Jane is totally useless at everything and Sam is a huge douche so I guess these two belong together. According to this book most people don't find their soul mate, jeez, patronizing much?  When they kiss Jane tastes of sassafras and cinnamon because, you know, of course she does. Oliver saves the whale and Jane and Sam have sex. Snore. It is the best sex ever, they didn't know it could be like this, blah blah blah, cliché, cliché, cliché. Let us reiterate that Jane is very sad and pathetic and has had a horrible life and that's why she needs a man to save her. That man is supposedly Sam but she can't have him because she is married to Oliver, but luckily she has a consolation prize in the form of her daughter. How do I put this delicately-what the fuck? Who are these people? Hadley and Rebecca fall in love, Rebecca catches her mom cheating on her dad and gets angry. Derr. Since Jane is as two faced and hypocritical as ever she makes Sam send Hadley away so that he won't sex up her daughter. Sam agrees for some inexplicable reason, okay, not that inexplicable since he wants to keep boinking Jane. He suggests they run away together and have loads of babies but at that inconvenient moment Oliver comes on the news declaring his love for whales Jane. Oh no, what will she decide? Just kidding, we all know she is going to completely choose the most insufferable and self righteous choice because that is what this book is about! Joley confronts Jane but for some reason wants her to go back to Oliver because...I don't know. He is in love with his sister and wants her for himself but wants her to make the right choice? Or something? I don't know. Oliver uses some hotline to find Jane and Rebecca but when he arrives he finds Jane and Sam sleeping together. He is, understandably, mad and he and Sam get into fisticuffs but they are interrupted by the realization that Rebecca is missing. They know where she is gone though, but for plot points it has to be Oliver and Sam who go and find her. After some shenanigans they find her and Hadley, having had the sex, on top of some cliff thing. After some argument Hadley tells Rebecca she has to go with her real dad and her new dad (just kidding) but they fight a bit and he  (Hadley) falls to his death from a cliff. Rebecca lets out an animal-like howl and starts trying to rip her heart out by clawing at her chest.She is taken to the hospital where everyone gathers around and nurses her back to health. After she is better, the happy family that is Oliver, Rebecca and Jane head home. At this point, since the end is nearing, everyone has their epiphanies. Joley tells Jane she is his and everyone else's anchor. Jane goes back to Oliver and decides to give it a go, she won't be able to forget Sam but then apparently she never forgot Oliver either, although it really seemed like she did. Oliver wants to make things right although it doesn't really seem like he does either. In short, they all don't really live happily ever after. Basically, I normally like unhappy endings but this just seemed so contrived to me. They are all unhappy because of their own poor choices, although, aren't we all really?

Fin
Next Fromage: Beautiful Darkness by Kami Garcia and Margaret Stohl

Fromage-Songs of the Humpback Whale-Part 3

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?

Songs of the Humpback Whale-Part 2

Ooooh there were so many interesting developments in this next section that...oh wait, no there weren't. I don't understand how this book clocks in at three hundred and some pages because basically the same stories just keep getting told over and over, from different perspectives. Normally this is a writing style I like but the different perspectives didn't reveal any new information so it just felt as though you were reading and re-reading the book. Previously mortal enemies Jane and Sam have reconciled and now are lovers instead because that's how these things happen. Jane is fretting and worrying about telling Rebecca that she wants to boink another man even though she is technically still married to Rebecca's dad. Rebecca is too busy wanting to boink Hadley  to notice these developments. Hadley keeps telling Rebecca she's no kid, even though, um that's exactly what she is but he wants to boink her without consequences. Hey, whatever works. Jane and Rebecca have more roadtrip adventures, but I won't recap them as I'm sure you can imagine what they are. Flash forward/back (honestly, I don't know anymore!) Hadley pretends he doesn't like Rebecca but then they make out. Jane asks Sam about his orchard and he gets his panties in a twist because...once upon a time he was cross eyed and no girls liked him and then he went to college and no girls liked him either because he was a farmer. Yikes, Sam needs to reign in his emo-ness. Jane recaps her first sexual experience with Oliver. Snore. Then we learn about her first day on the orchard when she fell down in some sheep poo and Sam laughed at her. Well, I would have done the same. Poo is funny! Meanwhile Sam and Hadley continue their spree of prejudice against women who aren't farmers. Oliver is boring and Joley is super creepy. He doesn't like Oliver because he is bad for Jane and once had a sex dream about Oliver and Jane, which is too disgusting to even think about. On their road trip Jane and Rebecca buy a car, steal some money and then Rebecca gets her period. Well obviously this is a book about "womanhood" so I guess it was inevitable. The two 'ladies' (personally, I feel a lot of annoyance towards books that use the word 'ladies' in an non-ironical sense) go shopping and Jane buys some sexy underwear and lingerie because the only time she wore lingerie Oliver ripped it. Geez, Oliver can't do anything right in this book.On the other hand though,  Oliver nearly has a fling with a waitress and then kindly informs us that he only cheated on Jane twice but it didn't mean anything so everything is okay. Ha! I love this guy. He should write a self help book about douchebaggery. Joley writes more creepy letters to Jane. Jane and Rebecca go to the sight of the plane crash that Rebecca survived when she was three. Oh and Jane learns to swim. Yay?
Ugh everything about this book seems so tired and out dated, but then again it was written in 1992 so maybe I would have a different perspective if I had been reading it then?

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