One True Thing

Quindlen, Anna

ISBN 10: 044022103X / ISBN 13: 9780440221036

Published by Dell Publishing Company, Inc., 1995

Item in very good condition! Textbooks may not include supplemental items i.e. CDs, access codes etc. Seller Inventory # 00103444547

Synopsis:

The basis of a 1998 motion picture starring Meryl Streep and William Hurt, a New York Times best-seller features a young woman wrongly imprisoned for the mercy killing of her mother. Reissue. Movie tie-in.

Review: Quindlen hits a nerve with One True Thing, which captures an experience seldom dealt with in popular culture. Though the heroine, Ellen Gulden, is a golden girl with two brothers who'll lose her career the instant she steps off the fast track, society concurs with her dad, who says, "It seems to me another woman is what's wanted here."

The book is a mother-daughter tale that should please fans of, say, The Joy Luck Club. It's not flashy, but it has a deep feel for the way children often discover, just before it's too late, who their parents really are. "Our parents are never people to us," Ellen writes, "they're always character traits.... There is only room in the lifeboat of your life for one, and you always choose yourself, and turn your parents into whatever it takes to keep you afloat." The mercy-killing subplot isn't gripping, but the palpable sense of deepening family intimacy certainly is. --Tim Appelo

Bibliographic Details

Title: One True Thing
Publisher: Dell Publishing Company, Inc.
Publication Date: 1995
Binding: Soft cover
Condition: Very Good