Bringle, Mary. True Confessions. New York: Donald I. Fine, 1996.
This sounds like it would be the title of a very juicy blog. Something I haven’t already spilled in some sordid way or another. Unfortunately, it’s only the latest challenge book for Book Lust. I read this in honor of Mother’s Day and I have to admit it was a strange choice. The inside book cover describes True Confessions (in part) as “…a mother who loves her to death and an ex-mother in-law who doesn’t approve…” So, yes, mothers are part of the story, but you never really meet either mother. As a result I didn’t get that loved to death feeling from mom, nor the disapprovefrom the ex-mother in-law.
But here’s the story in a nutshell: Grace teaches writing in New York, lies to her mother about her location (mom thinks she’s in England), struggles with relationships and fantasizes about being a story in a magazine she is obsessed with called – you guessed it – True Confessions. Grace doesn’t have direction. In the beginning she seems shallow and self-absorbed. Of course there is a period of growth through odd incidents such as her friend’s affair revealed on television, a kidnapping, and even a death. When it is all said and done, Grace emerges a stronger, wiser person.
Critics describe the book as funny, but I have to admit the first laugh-out-loud moment I had was when Grace is in Central Park with her friend Naomi. Naomi has two children, but acts like she wasn’t meant for motherhood: “Grace always felt grateful to Naomi for refusing to submit to the role which it would have been so natural for her to assume” (p 68). On describing her daughter Alice, Naomi says, “Sometimes I think we have her on loan, like a library book…sometimes…it’s not even a book I want to finish” (p 68). There is more. Naomi rants about trying to keep kids away from television. “…unless you want them to be social pariahs they’ll be contaminated sooner or later” (p 69.
Another favorite line: “lunacy is quite impartial. Warps in the genes, screwy endocrines – they don’t count” (p72).
BookLust Twist: From Book Lust in the chapter “Mothers and Daughters” (p 160).
~*LunaSea*~ 