by Joyce Carol Oates
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Product Description
New York Times bestselling author of The Falls, Blonde, and We Were the Mulvaneys, Joyce Carol Oates returns with a dark, wry, satirical tale—inspired by an unsolved American true-crime mystery. "Dysfunctional families are all alike. Ditto 'survivors.'" So begins the unexpurgated first-person narrative of nineteen-year-old Skyler Rampike, the only surviving child of an "infamous" American family. A decade ago the Rampikes were destroyed by the murder of Skyler's six-year-old ice-skating champion sister, Bliss, and the media scrutiny that followed. Part investigation into the unsolved murder; part elegy for the lost Bliss and for Skyler's own lost childhood; and part corrosively funny exposé of the pretensions of upper-middle-class American suburbia, this captivating novel explores with unexpected sympathy and subtlety the intimate lives of those who dwell in Tabloid Hell. Likely to be Joyce Carol Oates's most controversial novel to date, as well as her most boldly satirical, this unconventional work of fiction is sure to be recognized as a classic exploration of the tragic interface between private life and the perilous life of "celebrity." In My Sister, My Love: The Intimate Story of Skyler Rampike, the incomparable Oates once again mines the depths of the sinister yet comic malaise at the heart of our contemporary culture.
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Average Customer Review:
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
 One of JCO's Best Books, 2008-10-06
In a (very) thinly disguised parody of the JonBenet Ramsey murder case, Oates turns her jaundiced and unfailingly incisive eye on the insanities of life in pre-meltdown America.
Writing from the perspective of the tortured older brother of involuntary child skating star "Bliss" Rampike, Oates brilliantly skewers felony parenting, our hunger for ever-bigger killer cars, social climbing, plastic surgery, Junior-Achievement-level philandering, television talk shows, the "news" media, celebrity,overly leveraged businesses, children-as-fashion-accessories, blowhard brainless businessmen, and the growing number of three-letter-acronynm-ed "diseases" invented to explain away children suffering from bad parenting and overhandling by the "caring" professions.
Although the book is a bit overlong and runs off the rails at one place in the plot, it's a fast and fascinating read. Oates' ability to stay in character and write as the drug-addled, guilt-saddled and perenially felony-parented Skyler -- including long rambling passages that rival James Joyce for sentence intensity -- is impressive.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
A vividly imaginative take on a popular crime..., 2008-09-25
My Sister, My Love is an imaginative take on the infamous Jon Benet Ramsey murder that captivated the American public. The book is prefaced by a disclaimer that, while it is inspired by actual events, the book is a fictional account. That being said, Joyce Carol Oates paints a vivid, highly-plausible if not exaggerated picture of the Ramsey family. It is intended to be a satirical statement on upper-middle class families as well as religion. At times, the characters are almost too predictable: Bix as the womanizing, money-hungry, ex-jock of a husband; Betsey as the passive, doting, overweight wife who clings to her bible. Oates has crafted her own take on the murder, seen through the eyes of the older son. His story is tragic to read and any reader will surely feel sorry for such a pathetic creature. I am a big fan of Oates and her unique and often poetic style. This wasn't one of my favorites of hers; however it was still very enjoyable. In this story, Oates 'solves' the murder in a very interesting way. It definitely serves to make the reader think.
As far as some of the negative reviews the book has gotten...I agree that the tiny footnotes get cumbersome (especially when the information given is so useless to the story). But remember, we are getting the story from inside the mind of a teenager who has many mental issues and a history of drug abuse. Sloppiness would be expected. I also think that the biggest issue when reading this book is that none of the characters are truly likable. Even the narrator struck me as being pathetic. It can be hard to read a story when you don't really care about what happens to the characters. None the less, I would still recommend the book.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
 Creepy and disappointing, 2008-09-07
I love Joyce Carol Oates and could not wait to pick up her new book. I was very disappointed in both the writing and the subject matter. I really felt it had nothing to say. It was creepy and left me with a bad feeling. I found I could put the book down for days as I did not care about a single character. I thought the tabloid press, which was supposed to be central to the story, was nonexistent. I hated the way it was written. It was not enjoyable to read and easy to forget.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
 Aging Oats, 2008-08-21
Having been a fan for many years (decades) of the prolific and brilliant Oates, I can only say this book confirms my sad theory she has, in fact, nothing more to say.
Isn't the son of the real Ramsey family still alive? What about the Father? Writng this mean, confused, rambling chaos of a suposedly ficticious character is not only bad writing but the worst in bad taste. Blond, which was her fictional biography of Marilyn Monroe was, at least, written long after Monroe was dead. There's no excuse for this kind of manipulation and exploitation of a real person and a real and tortured family. It sounds like titilating, tabloid press.
It was entirely too long, entirely too repetitive and disappointing.
Seems like Ms. Oates has just written herself out of commentary. Her characters, lately, are bad imitations of some of her most brilliant ones written long ago. Ms. Oates, you do not HAVE to write a book a year, anymore. Please stop and reconsider what you teach.
0 of 0 people found the following review helpful:
Read it on my Kindle, 2008-08-18
I read this book on my Kindle and only discovered through talking with a friend who read it in paper form that there were footnotes throughout the book. On the Kindle, there are asterisks but no footnotes at the bottom of the pages. Only after finishing the book did I find page after page of the footnotes, totally out of context, at the end of the story. I would say that this bothered me except that I looked at the paper version of the book and was so bored by the footnotes that I actually preferred my "no footnotes" Kindle version.
Great story....interesting interpretation of the whole JonBenet saga.
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