The Memory Keeper's Daughter

I am a lefty. It's not something I define myself by, or an interesting fact I would share about myself, but somehow, people will undoubtedly notice and comment on the fact. When I was in kindergarten until second grade, learning to form letters and numbers, teachers would attempt to teach me how to grip my pencil or form my letters the right way, not backwards. During this time of my life, I got a lot of comments on my left-handedness from classmates. The most memorable one was in second grade, when a know-it-all told me that being left-handed meant I had a twin in the womb, but he or she died during the pregnancy.

Haunted by this, I went home and thought long and hard about what it would have been like to have a twin. I felt like I should have remembered losing this twin in the womb, or felt some sense of loneliness as I grew up alone. With a twin, would I have been less social? Would we dress alike? Would he or she have shared my love of reading, or would we be opposites? I would have had an automatic best friend and advocate, a partner in crime and someone else to fight with in our already large family. The idea was appealing, but after some time, I decided I was content to be alone, myself.

Imagine how you would feel if you actually did have a twin who had died at birth. Or was still alive. That's one of the situations explored in The Memory Keeper's Daughter, a Jodi Picoult-esque novel chronicling the ripples of a decision made by Dr. David Henry on the night his wife, Norah, gives birth to twins, one with Down Syndrome. Dr. Henry, on realizing that the girl, Phoebe, has Down's Syndrome, quickly hands her to Caroline, the nurse for the delivery, and tells her to take the girl to an institution for children like her. Instead, Caroline disappears with Phoebe to raise her as her daughter. David tells his wife that their little girl was stillborn, and raises their son Paul as though this were the case.

The effect that this decision has on each of their lives is explored thoroughly and for some, painfully, in this book. Norah sinks into depression, anger, and frustration, David into similar emotions which drive them apart. Their sinking marriage in turn causes strife for Paul in his teenage years, driving him to bad decisions and resulting in overwhelming loneliness for the entire family. Conversely, Caroline meets a man, Al, and happily marries him, raising Phoebe with tender love and care. The opposite pictures of family life, from happy and loving to distant and affair-ridden, speak of the deepest kind of irony: that David Henry thought his family would be happier without his daughter.

Accompanied by beautiful prose, the characters' lives undergo a complicated journey, hard to follow, and very sad. To watch one family fall apart is miserable, while at the same time, I wished for even more telling of Caroline, Al, and Phoebe's happy life. Though the story, at times, drags or feels pointless, the language always is rich and full of imagery, making it more enjoyable. However, the language felt a bit out of place within the grittiness of the story, and often, descriptions seem to be contradictory or repetitive. The attempt was appreciated; the execution, a bit off.

The trouble is, at the conclusion of the book, there is no real redemption for many of the characters. The ending, while satisfying enough, doesn't promise a change in many of the lifestyles, and forgiveness, while possible, doesn't seem near. Realistic in some ways, yes, but I longed for a full solution to many of the problems. Funnily enough, though, perhaps the best part of the book was the very end, when (**SPOILERS**) Phoebe and Paul meet. To watch his prejudices regarding Down's Syndrome melt away and change was the most interesting and beautiful part for me. Society still as a whole seems to be prejudiced against Down's Syndrome, and I know I certainly am. To look at them in a book without the label of their face, just as their dialogue and surroundings certainly made me rethink my perspective on Down's Syndrome. I was reminded that they have thoughts and feelings just like mine, they just express them in a different way. It was a great, eye-opening moment.

But couldn't the rest of the book have been similarly themed? I felt the author missed so many opportunities to create a truly meaningful portrait against Down's Syndrome prejudice, or just as a way to educate the audience about it. But the book got bogged down in the depression and problems of the other characters, without spending enough time on Phoebe or her life. With this addition, this book could have been pushed past simple fiction and into a much more powerfully moving book.