My Sister's Keeper | Teen Ink

My Sister's Keeper

September 24, 2008
By Anonymous

What if all you felt you were good for was for keeping someone else alive? Anna Fitzgerald has felt this way her entire life. For as long as she can remember, Anna has been in and out of the hospital. Not for her own illnesses, but for her older sister, Kate's. When Anna was younger, she was glad to give her sister the blood or tissue she needed to live. Back then, it made her feel good to help her sister out, but as she grows older, and it begins to prohibit her from her own social life, she starts to think differently. Her thoughts are made complete when her mother and father expect Anna to give one of her kidneys to her sister. As Anna listens to the long-term effects of such a surgery, she realizes that she doesn't want to base her life on her sister's anymore. Anna decides it's time to fight for rights to her own body. She talks to her older ‘forgotten' rebel brother, Jesse, who tells Anna not to mess with the code that has become their family. “Don't mess with the system, Anna,” he says bitterly. “We've all got our scripts down pat. Kate plays the martyr. I'm the Lost Cause. And you, you're the Peacekeeper.”

My Sister's Keeper is a novel that will keep the reader hooked until the very last word. Picoult's characters become like family and readers begin to feel what the characters feel. Picoult pulls readers in with her masterfully crafted plot and keeps them enthralled until the very end. If you are a fantasy fan, this book might not be your cup of tea. It is aimed more toward science fiction fans, and non-fiction readers. Some of the only drawbacks to the book are the catalogs of medical terms used in the story. Picoult does a fairly good job at making the meaning of most of them clear, but sometimes readers just have to skim by the word and hope for the best. Overall, I think this is one of the best books ever written. It teaches people to not go with what they've always known and also looks at the value of family.


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