#3 - One True Thing by Anna Quindlen

I've had One True Thing by Anna Quindlen on my bookshelf for a while after picking it up at a used book sale. People have suggested I read Anna Quindlen for years now, especially when I was an aspiring journalist in high school. As a graduation gift I recieved a copy of her autobiography Thinking Out Loud. At the time, the gift was partially a joke, a reference to my inability to censor my thoughts at time, so I don't remember if I ever finished reading the collection of essays. Also, I can't really stand feminists.

That being said, Quindlen is a good writer and I have frequently read her columns and thought about the two books sitting absently on my bookshelf written by her. As luck would have it, I kept leaving my new library book at work and decided to grab One True Thing as I departed for a plane ride.

The book is the story of a recent college graduate (Harvard of course) who abadons her important-to-her life in NYC to care for her dying mother. All the while her father is a self-important college professor who doesn't seem to care what is happening in his home and her boyfriend is a sex-obsessed jerk who just doesn't seem to care at all. What I liked most about this story is that the daughter admits to not being close to her mother at all for the first 24 years of her life and gets to know and respect her in her final days.

One of the best lines in the book was something like "the last person to understand a marriage is the children involved." And I think that's true. Children often see their parents relationship through rose colored glasses or a perspective they've been fed to believe. Watching the main character grow up and realize that the things she assumed were true abour her mother, her father and herself were false was a lesson I took very seriously.

All in all, One True Thing was an exciting read with a little mystery thrown in. I'm glad I picked it up after all these years.

Read: 320 pages
Saved: $11.16 new at Amazon