Alex+Watts+Book+Excerpt

Back to Alex Watts Home Page Back to The Bible Back to Breathing Underwater Back to Jodi Picoult Author Page Back to My Sister's Keeper Literay Page Back to My Sister's Keeper Promotion Page ** My parents and I are sitting together at a table in the hospital cafeteria, although I use the word //together// loosely. It’s more like we’re astronauts, each wearing a separate helmet, each sustained by our own private source of air. My mother has the little rectangular container of sugar packets in front of her. She is organizing them with ruthlessness, the Equal and then the Sweet ‘n Low and then the nubbly brown natural crystals. She looks up at me. “Honey.” ** ** Why are terms of endearment always foods? Honey, cookie, sugar, pumpkin. It’s not like caring about someone is enough to actually sustain you. ** **My heart is a soft sponge at the base of my throat. “You mean it’s okay to stop?”** ** No more blood draws. No granulocytes or lymphocytes or stem cells or kidney. “If you want, I’ll tell Kate,” I offer. “So you don’t have to.” **
 * My Sister’s Keeper [[image:watts.mysisterskeepermovie.jpg width="400" height="263" align="left"]] **
 * Excerpt **
 * “I understand what you’re trying to do here,” my mother continues. “And I agree that maybe your father and I need to listen to you a little bit more. But Anna, we don’t need a judge to help us do this.” **
 * When she smiles, it feels like the first warm day of March—after an eternity of snow, when you suddenly remember how summer feels on the backs of you bare calves and in the part of your hair. “That’s //exactly// what I mean,” my mother says. **
 * “That’s all right. Once Judge DeSalvo knows, we can pretend it never happened.” **
 * In the back of my mind, a hammer trips. “But… won’t Kate ask why I’m not her donor anymore?” **
 * My mother goes very still. “When I said //stop//, I meant the lawsuit.” **
 * I shake my head hard, as much to give her an answer as to dislodge the knot of words tangled in my gut. (page 179-180) **

This excerpt is important because you can see the list of priorities in Sara Fitzgerald’s head. She needs to cure Kate first and then take care of her other children. Sara didn’t think of the effect that the lawsuit was having on Anna. She only thought of all the stress that she had to go through to get Anna to stop being ridiculous. Throughout the book she kept saying that the whole ordeal was just a misunderstanding, but I think that it was her who misunderstood. This excerpt shows the relief that Anna would feel if she was no longer defined by if she could save her sister. She had to find out who she was without Kate, and she was unable to do that while being Kate’s donor. ** Next to My Sister's Keeper Book Review
 * Significance: