Boekverslag Anna Quindlen

Geschreven door:	anoniem (6 vwo) [meer]
Datum ingestuurd:	11 november 2004
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Woorden:	1.550
Bekeken:	2345 keer (2 deze maand)
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Titel:	One true thing
	De enige waarheid
Auteur:	Anna Quindlen
Jaar van uitgave:	1998
Aantal pagina's:	289

Auteur:	Anna Quindlen
Geslacht:	vrouw
Nationaliteit:	Engels
Populaire titels:	1998One true thing (1)

• 
  Door bekkennoob op 14-06-2006
  handige site !! xxxxx

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Part One

The story is about Ellen Gulden. A young successful career woman, but then her mother gets cancer. Ellen is the one who has to take care of her mother, until she dies. She gives up her career, her friends, her normal life to do this.

(Bij elk bolletje begint een nieuw hoofdstukje in het boek, de hoofdstukken zijn niet aangegeven d.m.v titels of nummering maar zijn wel in de opmaak te bemerken.)

· She describes the last normal day in her life, and in the lives of her family members. With her brother she’s is talking about their personalities. She’s also talking about the qualities of her mother, her mother was for example a real homemaker. Her father tells her that specific day that her mother has different kinds of cancer, and got to do chemotherapy.
· Her father demands her to take care of her sick mother for the next few months. Ellen doesn’t know id she’s going to do this, she feels forced by her father and wishes she didn’t had to do this.
· Ellen had quit her job at the magazine and sublet her apartment. Her boss even offered her promotion or a few weeks off but she’s sure about this. Her friend Jules took her to lunch and they’re discussing if Ellen’s doing the right thing. Ellen goes home, her mother is very surprised with her coming, but also wonders if it’s good for Ellen to come home for such a long time.
· Ellen and her mother start a book group. They read books and discuss them. The discussions are soon ending up with other issues. For example the marriage of her parents.
· Ellen confronts her father with her discontent about her being the only person who’s taking care of her mother. Her father disagrees and feels it’s her duty, not his.
· Ellen tells how her father cheated on her mother. He had sex with other women on his work. She discovered this when she was younger, after her she found out, their relationship changed. Ellen also changes after this discovery, she starts judging everything and everyone harshly.
· Ellen describes the hospital situation. The chemotherapy is clearly a terrible experience but these months are still beautiful months for her mother. Ellen and her mother finally have the relationship she always had imagined.
· Ellen and her mother organised a wonderful lunch with a group of women. The group of women always decorates Christmas trees.
· The cancer is progressing far more quickly than the doctors every would have suspected. She is suffering of a lot of pain and gets morphine. The doctor suggest a psychiatrist for Ellen and her mother.
· Her brothers came home for a few days, and were shocked by the look of their mother. Jonathan (formal boyfriend) also comes by unexpected. Her mother has trouble accepting her health problems, and thinks a wheelchair is humiliating.
· Ellen, Jeff (brother) and Jon are going to a bar after they had family Thanksgiving dinner. Ellen starts getting angry because she does all the hard work, and it’s tired of being her mother. Her relationship with Jon ends (again). She later found out that he cheated on her the day after the broke up.
· Ellen goes shopping with her mother, they meet a lot of (formal) friends of her mother. Ellen talks to a high school teacher of her, Mrs. Forburg. The teacher invites her for dinner, but Ellen rejects.
· Ellen had lunch with her father, he wonders if Ellen need some more help. They fight about the fact that her father patrician in the care of her mother is minimal. He’s not there for her. He has a hard time accepting that she’s going to die.
· The doctors advises Ellen to hire a nurse once a week, but she doesn’t want this. Jonathan calls again, they fight again.
· Ellen starts giving her mother more and more morphine. One morning there’s a nurse at the door. She’s going to help Ellen and her mother. Ellen feels a little bit like a stranger when she noticed how good the nurse and mother connect. They are having good conversations and her mother likes the woman.
· The friends of Ellen’s mother are still acting weird, the acknowledge it all. Her parents are going out for dinner, but it wasn’t successful. Her mother felt that everybody was looking at her. The doctor has taken the decision to discontinue the chemotherapy.
· The night they lit the Christmas trees on the green was a perfect night as always. Her mother’s decorated tree was also the best of all as always.
· Brian and Jeff are back home for a few days. Theresa (nurse) makes her second visit. Her mother has had hallucinations, and Theresa is telling what the cause could be. They are having a nice time with the family while Brian and Jeff are home.
· Then, in January, the hospital bed is placed in the living room. The eyesight of her mother is going. Her mother starts losing her will to live. Ellen still might want to see a psychiatrist.
· Still no one came to see Ellen and her other. Her mothers health gets worse and worse. She can’t get out of the bathtub on her own anymore for example.
· Her mother starts to become both child an mother. She spends an awful lot of time laying in the hospital bed. Ellen also has a difficult time. Her mother only lays in her bed, laying on one side, staring out of the window. Her mother tries to fix the relationship between Ellen and her father. Ellen cries out by her mother. Her mother asks her to help her dying.
· Her mother can’t even go to the toilet by herself anymore. That’s why she starts wearing diapers. Then the night of her death arrives. She tells Ellen and her father that she doesn’t want to live anymore. She suddenly dies in Ellen’s hand. Ellen stays very calm, and hold her hand for the rest of the night. When her father wakes up in the morning, and comes downstairs, Ellen is still very relaxed, and just says her mother died, and makes a cup of coffee.

Part Two

· They have found out that the cause of her mother’s death is probably a overdose of morphine. Some officers come to Ellen and ask her some questions about it. Ellen is suspected of the overdose, and has to spend the night in jail. She also has to appear in court. Eventually she gets out, but didn’t see her father for 8 years after the happening. It was him or her, who gave the overdose. Ellen definitely chooses him.
· Ellen is thinking of why and how her father had overdosed her mother with morphine. Perhaps her mother had asked of him, what she had asked from her, only he did it. He did gave her the overdose morphine. Mrs Forburg, the old teacher of Ellen, bails Ellen out and let her stay at her place. Ellen finds out Jon nailed her, he told an important man that Ellen once said she wishes her mother died. Jeff’s going to get Ellen a lawyer.
· Ellens therapist wants her to keep a journal since the moment she got arrested. In the mean while the number of reporters outside Mrs. Forburgs house grew, then ebbed, then grew again. According to some people Ellen became a symbol to millions of people of how caring family members are victimized by a system to that offers no hope to their loved ones. Ellen loses a lot of weight during this period. Ellens father is trying to contact her all the time, she ignores his messages.
· Ellen has a hard time paying her lawyer. Jeff already payed a big amount of money. Ellen likes her lawyer, he’s a nice man, helps her a lot. They discuss the whole situation.
· Ellen still has to live like a nun. One day Ellen goes out, ignoring all the advice to stay inside. She talks with a bartender about Mrs. Forburg. Later, she talks with a boy she knew from lighting the Christmas trees. They get drunk and end up in bed together.
· By the beginning of April the grand jury had heard a dozen witnesses, including Jonathan. Jeff and Ellen went to the cemetery, Ellen plants some hyacinths on her grave. Ellen still has a little bit of contact with Theresa. But the hospital doesn’t allow Theresa to see Ellen. Ellen has a conversation with Mrs. Forburg about her parents. Her father is in her head all the time, and her mother is just a presence.
· The day Ellen testified before the grand jury, the newspaper ran a profile of her. A large page full with facts about Ellen. When Ellen and her lawyer arrive at the courthouse, it’s full with reporters in the lobby. The prosecutor is asking Ellen a lot of questions, about what she’s said to people, about the situation at home, about her relationship with people. The final question was if Ellen loved her mother. She says she did, more than loving. When your mother is gone, you’ve lost your past, Ellen says.
· The grand jury had decided not to indict Ellen for the death of Katherine B. Gulden. Everybody’s happy for her, Mrs. Forburg, Jeff, Theresa and many more. There are also a lot of press calling her, but Ellen ignores them. Ellen immediately takes the train to the city, where Jules is waiting for her. Jules has found a great home for her and Ellen in New York City. Ellen is glad to be back home..