This is the murder story of the six-year-old Bliss Rampike told by his older brother Skyler Rampike. Despite the Author’s Note/Disclaimer in the beginning of this grim novel, the plot is based on the Jon-Benet-Ramsey murder totally. The author focuses on bad parenting, hunger for fame and fortune, social climbing and everything that comes with it.

Bad parenting shows in the father’s pushing his son to such a degree that Skyler gets injured very badly, and for his mother, his limping becomes something to be ashamed of. Bad parenting also shows in pushing the younger Bliss to such extremes that the child feels if she doesn’t perform well, she will not be loved.

In the beginning, Skyler Rampike feels he is the apple of his mother Betsey’s eye, Mummy’s little man, before his little sister takes to ice-skating. Skyler’s sister Edna Louise becomes an instant star and Skyler loses his standing with Mummy, the frustrated wife and social-climber. Daddy is Bix Rampike, the CEO, detached from his family. As soon as Edna Louise Rampike starts shining on ice, her name is officially changed to Bliss Rampike for star attraction. Since Bliss the prodigy lures media’s attention, Betsey and Bix rise to a higher social status as they get accepted to a snooty country club.

When Bliss is murdered in exactly the same way as Jon-Benet and found in the furnace room of the house, Skyler grieves deeply and sincerely for his sister, but because he is drugged by his mother’s hand-picked physicians for his other ills, he doesn’t remember what happened that night and believes the lies told by his mother that he may be the guilty one. The family is deeply traumatized by this murder, and this supposed child’s play-murder is hidden from the police by the parents for the welfare of Skyler, their only child left alive. At the end of the book, Skyler learns who really killed Bliss, and it is not him.

Although, the book’s story is an after-story and the reader’s knowledge of the Jon-Benet case is there, the writer keeps the reader guessing until the end. This may be a smart tool to use in the craft of writing, but in such a long and tedious book that offers so many possibilities, the reader becomes exasperated at the end and, to tell the truth, he may not care after all who killed who.

The story is told years later when Skyler is nineteen, and his voice shines throughout the book as the child broken by guilt and monstrous, self-absorbed parents. Still, Skyler manages to survive bad parents, psychiatric hospitals and boarding schools, and finally, all that happened to him. At the end, in the author’s words, “ He forgave, not for Bliss, he could not forgive for Bliss but for himself, he forgave them…” and in Skyler's words, “ I hope I hope I can make it” shows Skyler saving at least a part of himself.

Skyler's character and the in-depth examination of a certain section of society's ills.

the length of the book and its disorganized format.

question my admiration for this author.

puzzled for I felt the author did not have the right to write this story the way she wrote it. After all, it was invading a real family's privacy whether a disclaimer was there or not. Everyone can recognize that this book is based on the Jon-Benet case, as all the twists and turns in the case are used in the fictional story. Also, the DNA evidence in the real case has later proved the parents innocent; therefore, I don't think the author should use this case so blatantly.

Joyce Carol Oates has won many awards and has garnered the respect and admiration of the writing world. Some of her other books are: The Gravedigger's Daughter, Black Girl / White Girl, Missing Mom, The Falls, The Tattooed Girl, I'll Take You There, Blonde, We Were the Mulvaneys, What I Lived For, Foxfire, Bellefleur, Solstice, A Garden of Earthly Delights, and Expensive People.

It was too long, too harsh, and too repetitive for my taste, even though this is an author I really like. You have to take your chances with this book if you decide to read it.

Joyce Carol Oates is one of my favorite authors because she can do so much with misfortune and perversity; however, this book is too long and too complicated. Although one can appreciate the work and craft that went into it, the story, with the exception of Skyler’s character, was not an interesting one for me.

The pace of the book is the kind only Oates can get away with, as it is choppy, and jumps from one thing to another and back, and it is usually difficult to distinguish if the voice belongs to Skyler the child or Skyler the adult. When I first listened to the audio version of the book, this was impossible to differentiate. Then I obtained the book, and I understood better, since the author uses visual means like charts and graphics.

Interested in buying this? Support Writing.Com by making your purchase of My Sister, My Love: The Intimate Story of Skyler Rampike   from Amazon.Com!

Created Jul 19, 2009 at 8:53pm • Submit your own review...