Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
Written with perseptive beauty., 23 Oct 2003
White Oleander is a passionate, hypnotic and dangerous novel, exploring un-spoken themes of today's tangled world.
Janet Fitch tells the moving and complicated story of Astrid, a child raised in a potent world of beauty and destruction. Her mother, a twisted and un-earthly artist raises her daughter into this potent world, before emotionally torturing and murdering her former lover, thus leaving Astrid alone and vulnerable. “White Oleander” explores Astrid’s emotional journey through countless foster homes, where she faces incest, murder and, above all, her own powerful mind.
But is not just the twisted, shocking plot which makes this novel un-missable. Fitch writes with tragic passion and charisma, making the characters and their broken worlds dance with life and colour. Each different part of Astrid’s slow clamber to adulthood evokes such empathy and impact, it is virtually impossible not to become addicted.
Although the plot at times becomes very complicated, this book explores love, loss, lust and life, looking at how we can as humans adapt and change over time.
However unbelievable it may seem, this story somehow really made an impact to me personally, making me look at the situations around me in a different way. Fitch makes the book especially enjoyable, by combining a high lexis and sentence structure with beautifully descriptive use of language. Her style makes the whole novel exceptionally pleasurable to read, as her selective use of verbs and adjectives helps us as readers to build up a vivid picture of the unfolding and intriguing life of a strong young ‘lady’. The book rapidly changes from an everyday story into a colourful bible for the aspiring artist in all of us.
In short, I think “White Oleander” is an original and wonderful piece of modern literature. It combines everything I enjoy in a book: wonderfully likable characters, a compelling plot and bags of stylish language technique. Throughout the book, I didn’t want the novel to end. I strongly recommend this compelling book to all e readers, as I think everybody should experience Janet Fitch’s captivating account of life and how truly lucky we are.
Review by Heidi-Victoria Ireland,
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8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
The best book I have read in 2000!, 3 Dec 2000
I cannot recommend this novel highly enough, and would encourage anyone who can appreciate a well written novel to buy this book. Considering this is Janet Fitch's first novel, it is an amazing piece of literature which keeps you spellbound from beginning to end. The narrator, Astrid, tells her story of being brought up by a hippie artistic and headstrong mother who kills her boyfriend out of revenge. When Ingrid is imprisoned, the story moves on to Astrid's experiences in foster care. The neglect and abuse Astrid receives are described without being oversentimental and therefore, the reader is engrossed and completely torn by these scenes. the fact that Astrid survives the experiences shows her strength of character which is an excellent reason to read the book. However, I was also facinated by the descriptions of the American care system as well. If you only read one book next year, read White Oleander.
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6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
Stunning, 5 April 2003
Put simply, White Oleander is an amazing book. I read it because after reading some of the 'lists' on Amazon, I realised that many people who had appreciated similar books to me had enjoyed it. I was not prepared however for the intensity and wonder of this novel, and am thoroughly surprised that Janet Fitch has not written more novels. For its 500 or so pages, White Oleander is firstly a tiny looking book, and more to the point, one that can be read in a fairly short amount of time, mainly due to the fact that the reader is unable to put it down. Firstly, the language is amazing, thoughtful and thought provoking. Astrid, the main character, has a deep relationship based on the admiration and dependence of her mother, a poet. She grows up, fatherless, with her mother the poet as her only guardian and, being intelligent, and eager to learn herself, she naturally inherits and develops her mother's talent for use of words and perceptive outlook of the world. All is going swimmingly until her mother is incarcerated for life, and Astrid's safe and almost predictable world is taken away and she is forced to face up to the reality of life by passing from foster home to foster home, where in each case she gains an insight into the everyday life of a huge variety of families and institutions. The way Fitch enables the reader to thoroughly know and understand Astrid is impeccable, and unlike many novels where several characters means the reader is confused, in White Oleander, the characters and families are so well defined that the reader understands exactly how each has played a part in the life education of Astrid. Each of the many characters is totally distinguished and essential to the story. Another huge merit of Fitch's work is the way Astrid grows from child to adult through the book, with no part of life missed, yet the story flows so naturally that the reader hardly notices this is happening. The reader is, in this way, able to thoroughly relate to Astrid and her experiences. I would recommend this book to absolutely anyone who appreciates beautiful and insightful language and a deeper insight into life experience. Altogether, a thoroughly satisfying reading experience.
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