Ordinary Beauty Paperback – June 14, 2011

I really hadn't even heard of this one, but I have always wanted to be part of a book club, so when I learned about the Not So YA Book Club I had to be a part of it. This was their book for September, so I checked the library and they DIDN'T HAVE IT. Epic tragedy. So I checked Amazon and HURRAH! They had it for like 5 bucks. So I bought it and some other books, not expecting much, but deeming it worthwhile for the overall experience.Turns out, though, that I really liked this. When I was a teen and up until a few months ago, I really shied away from 'issues books,' because they're depressing and who needs that from your escapist reads, right? Plus, I'm pretty sure I assumed they were all like Lurlene McDaniel or something, disgustingly sappy and unrealistic. After reading a couple though, I realized that I actually LOVE the incredibly heartrending contemps that make all of the people with souls cry, though I generally don't.Ordinary Beauty is almost unrelentingly depressing. The overall tone is one of despair and desperation. Sayre Bellavia has had an awful, awful life, all because of the influence of her drug addict mother. Ordinary Beauty focuses on that relationship. Some other things happen and some other characters do matter, but what it really comes down to is Sayre and her mother.Impregnated at 15, already a party girl and maker of bad decisions, Sayre's mother decided to have her baby, I think mostly because she only realized she was pregnant when it was too late to do anything about it. The news of Sayre's impending birth caused the grandfather to keel over for one reason or another, throwing the pampered daughter into a spiral and serious drug abuse from which she never recovered. The mother always resents Sayre for destroying her life, never shows any motherly tenderness, which Sayre can never stop craving. I wanted so badly to shake her and get her to freaking leave and go ANYWHERE.Luckily, Sayre spent the first seven years of her life in a fairly stable environment, living with her grandmother and not her mom. This gave her a fairly normal outlook, and perhaps spared her from some of the worst emotional scars. However, most of the rest of her life has been a succession of dirty houses, abuse (mostly verbal) and neglect.The story alternates between numbered chapters, the present timeline, in which Sayre's mother is dying from, well, basically her life, and titled chapters that are her reflections on the past inspired by the mom's impending death. Because it's not linear, we know that, even when times get better, that even worse things are ahead for Sayre, so there's some major dramatic irony going on. Also, even though I essentially knew what was coming, I really didn't guess how it would happen.The whole group had some issues with the book, each of us struggling with Sayre's normalcy and with some of the situations in the book. One that we all doubted was that Sayre's mom would go to the hospital and receive Oxycontin, even though she'd been sent to rehab in the past for drug abuse. Even though I did look askance at a number of things like that, they didn't really subtract from the reading experience too much, because I got so caught up in Sayre's story.The ending, though. The ending just felt so rushed and out of left field. The rest of the book was so sad and then all of a sudden there's a happy ending? What? Plus, there are some sort of dropped plot lines and some skipped time and it's just really unclear. Sayre just magically gets over everything so fast and this, I felt, was the most unrealistic part of the book, little inconsistencies aside. Much as I want Sayre to have a happy ending, it should not have been so idyllic, so untempered by her painful past.Overall, I still really, really liked this, and now want to read all of Wiess's other books. I think everyone in the book club liked it, though most of them sobbed and don't want to read another sad book for like a year. I, however, want more of them.

Interest in Book: It's obvious that this is not a book I would normally read. I am glad that my book club chose it for September's read, as it was emotional and affected me deeply. Sayre, a teenage girl on the cusp of adulthood, recounts her extremely difficult life in Podunk Town, USA, as her mother lies dying in the hospital from an extreme life of her own.My Thoughts: This book was intense in a way that makes your heart hurt and your head spin as the horrific reality of Sayre's situation permeate your bones. The setting is impoverished and stark, the existence of the characters painful, traumatic, bleak. Watching another person experience such abuse, neglect and trauma is difficult to swallow. While this is fiction, it is every day reality for many children. Sayre's experience may resonate with some readers who have experienced such trauma, or know someone who has. I'd say that a good many of us can relate in some form or another.The book flips from present day (roughly 24 hour time frame minus last chapter) to flashbacks of Sayre's life. I really enjoy books that do this, but some indication of time would have been helpful. It's obvious that she continues to age throughout the flashbacks, but it would have been nice to have dates. Sayre is a good narrator. She picks up on interesting details, and it progresses as she grows to show moving from concrete to abstract thinking.Sayre's mother is a beast of a character. A very sick individual who turns to drugs, alcohol and men to numb the pain of her failures and could-have-beens. I assume she blames Sayre for everything wrong in her life. Her mother's actions towards Sayre were vile and horrible beyond words. I think when she looks at Sayre, she sees all the things she hates about her own self. It's not easy to accept your own character flaws. Her mother's best friend, Candy, was just as vile and her treatment of Sayre just as disgusting. I sometimes wonder if Candy was a huge influence on mom's downward spiral to Hell, or if she would have ended up the same without her.Sayre's compassion for others, despite her environment and experience with people, was awe-inspiring. We first meet her as she's walking home from her waitress job in ugly, snowy conditions. She's got dinner in her hands, leftovers from the diner. Growing up never knowing when the next meal would be, she still feeds a bobcat on the way home, and a small kitten she has been caring for under the trailer. Her first encounter with Evan, a boy in town, culminates in a life-threatening moment for him. She stays with him until help arrives. There are little snippets like these that really drive home the reality that Sayre is definitely different from her mother.The most interesting aspect of this book was when Sayre finally makes it to the hospital to visit her mother. Even though she feels extremely negative emotions towards her, she bargains and remains in denial that her mother's life is coming to an end. She questions how deep the bond goes between a mother and her child."And maybe love is terrifying. I'm terrified now, but not in the way she would think.I'm terrified because I hate who she is and what she's done, I do, and yet there is still something strong and powerful between us, some kind of deep, primal bond that won't end, won't snap or break or change, it just remains there inside me, as solid and factual as my blood and bones - she is my mother, I am her daughter - and I don't know what to call it because it doesn't feel like love, not the good kind I felt for Ellie, with all my heart, but instead an instinctual pull that's been there from the beginning, drawing me back to her again and again, the woman who has hurt me like no one else ever could, and now she's dying and the bond is still here, inside me, and I won't call it love or hate because emotions has nothing to do with the fact that she is my mother and I am her daughter, and we will be connected in that way forever."This scene is one that stuck with me. As a social worker, I often hear people baffled over the fact that many children take the abuse given to them by parents, that they don't speak up and flee for safety. As an adult, it's so very hard to put yourself in a child's shoes. I think it's difficult for people to understand that at the end of the day, after the screaming, cursing and violence, that the child remains because that is their parent. Children want to please people, especially their parents, and they are also egocentric and feel like every single problem that rains down on their head is their own fault. Therefore, they do not want to cause more trouble for their parents than they already perceive they are doing. When love and affection is doled out, it only adds to the confusion, as the child wonders what exactly love is. That of course adds to the violent cycle that many families are trapped in. Sayre sums it up here:"If she'd said she loved me and still did all those cruel and careless things, would my child mind have decided to accept that as the definition of love?Probably.Would I have ended up believing that love was manipulative and hurtful and full of pain, gotten use to being shoved aside, sworn at and disregarded, picked up and hugged, and then slapped around for getting in the way, starved and smiled at, neglected and cursed, told I was no good and would never amount to anything, then hefted high and proudly shown off down at the Walmart, introduced as a little pisser and a big mistake in the same breath?Yes, I would have, because if she said she loved me and then acted that way I would have thought that was how you loved someone, and how someone should love you back."During book club, people stated that Sayre was too normal, too "together" to have come from such trauma. They needed to see something broken in her to make it more realistic. While I agree that Sayre came out of her situation a little too "healthy", I also truly believe in resiliency. Studies have shown that having one caring, responsible adult in a child's life can make all the difference. This evidence is why mentoring programs are popular and receive funding. In my mind, Sayre had a few of these adults scattered throughout her life. Her grandmother, Ms. Mo, Beale and his mother. People I think the reader should experience rather than me telling you about them here. Because of these characters, Sayre experienced sprinkles of hope, love and compassion. These moments may have been enough...Of course, if the author were to write a follow-up novel, I expect some borderline personality traits, therapy, anxiety issues...something. ;)Lasting Impressions: It's obvious I have many thoughts about this book. If you made it through all of them, you deserve a cookie! I could no doubt talk about it in-depth for hours, but I will sum it up here: There are moments of joy and utter heartbreak. You may smile, cry, scream, gasp, laugh, sigh. Gut-wrenching sob fest. You may question the ability of people to continue on in such dire environments. You may be inspired by Sayre's perseverance and sheer will to survive and overcome. I was.

Ordinary Beauty has left me a wreck. Never have I been left so emotionally drained from reading a book. While this may sound negative to some, it is one of the best feelings I can great from reading. I know this book and Sayre's story will be with me for a long time.Laura Wiess has written a heartbreaking and gut-wrenching story of a young girl who has lived a life of abuse, abandonment and neglect with very few moments of hope. The novel begins just as Sayre learns that her mother has been admitted to the hospital once again and is forced out of the house to walk miles in the ice and snow to visit her. In an attempt to avoid being hit on the snow-covered road, she actually causes an accident and must try to save the severely injured driver. It is during the hours of waiting for help to arrive that Sayre begins to lend her voice, bit by bit, to all of the horrors she has endured growing up with an addict for a mother and break away from a past that has had a stranglehold on her for her entire life.This was a tough story to read but I was pulled in immediately and couldn't stop until I knew that Sayre was going to be okay. The emotional struggles that she went through while retelling her memories to her mother on her death-bed had me in knots time after time. Just when I thought I knew the worst of it, there was always something else even more devastating. And I think what got me the most was seeing, very vividly, this young child experience all of this pain. This is a testament to Wiess's no holds barred writing to reveal a truth that many people willingly ignore.Even though I am now a mess from reading this book, I recommend it to anyone who doesn't shy away from the harsh truths of the world of addiction and wants to read a story so real that it haunts you to your core.