BOOK DISCUSSION: The Memory Keepers Daughter

[Joy]

Here is the thread where you can discuss The Memory Keepers Daughter.
Anyone is welcome to join in the discussion.

[barbszy]

I'm in the middle of my second time through this book--it's even better the second time around.

Looking forward to hearing what everyone thinks of this story.

[debknechtel]

I have not been able to get a copy so I could reread this book but I loved it the first time around. I am foggy on names but I remember feeling so much pain for the mother who knew nothing of her daughter who was still alive. I was very angry with the dad at first but all the guilt he carried around with hm for all those years. I thank goodness that we know live in a time where we are more accepting and treat children with downs as reg children and people in this world who can function if given the right tools and lots of love and compassion. I thought the story was told very well and I could feel what each character was going through.

Hugs Debbie

[Joy]

I liked the book, but I too had some very bad feeling about the father. It seems so unreal to make such a snap decision to give his daughter away in the first place. I did begin to pity him at the end of the book as he realized what a mess he had made of his family's lives. I also had a hard time with the mother and how she dealt with her grief sometimes. I think with her my feeling were more mixed as she was being kept in the dark about her daughter. I am not sure I have completely sorted out my feelings about her at all.
My first child was a full term stillborn son. I had a hard time getting into this book at first and I think my own experience of loosing a child gave me a different perspective on the charactors.

[barbszy]

I did pity the father; I feel like he panicked when he sent the baby away. I was surprised that he told his wife about the baby at all--I would have figured that he'd just let her be happy with the one baby and never breathe a word about the other one. That would have been more believable to me.

But all the while I have been reading this, the old saying comes back to me: "Tell the truth--there's less to remember."

[Joy]

Anyone else out there finished The Memory Keepers Daughter and would like to add to this discussion?

[Sammi1961]

I am glad the baby did not end up in an institution, but was rather shocked that the father could make such a snap decision in giving his daughter away. I also was surprised and a bit disappointed in how the mother dealt with her grief. I felt an affair was out of character for her.

[Pippe]

Maybe I should have read this book a second time but I had a hard time the first time. I may be in the minority but I didn't think that the characters always rang true. The mother drank and drove her little child around in the car. Didn't anyone notice or care that she did? When the brother took off when he was finally getting some positive attention and there were no real reprocussions to it? It just seemed to me that a thread or a idea was introduced but not followed through. It was a sad, disfunctional family that was rather haunting.

Pippe

[barbszy]

Pippe, I had some of the same thoughts on my second time through the book. I think on the first read I was more involved in the emotions of the characters and this time I read it more rationally.

[Sammi1961]

I agree that the actions of the characters did not always ring true. Barbszy, I also wondered why the father even mentioned the baby to his wife because had he never mentioned it, there would be no constant and continuous grieving on her part so things would have been so different. Of course, then maybe there would have been no story. I think I almost liked the story of the sister more than that of the brother.