Betty

 

I haven't ugly sobbed at a book in years. The last 100 pages were just a cry fest for me. This book has some of the most memorable characters - and this flawed fucked up family is so precious and wonderful that I wish I could know them in real life - I felt right at home in their insanity. Betty was born to a Cherokee father and a poor white mother in southern Ohio in the early sixties. As a middle child of of seven and the only one who inherited her father's "indigenous" looks she often gets into mischief and has trouble fitting in. She loves listening to her father's tall tales and making up stories of her own - in fact there are certain parts of her family's history that she wishes she could re-write. For some reason Betty becomes the repository for her family's dark secrets. Her mother confides in her an awful ugly, truth that she never even told her husband and her eldest sister tries to lie about something that Betty wasn't supposed to see. A very dark coming of age story filled with incest, dark secrets, brutal pet deaths, and depression. I will say though that light shines through particularly well when balanced by the all the dark. There are truly some amazing moments and it isn't all bad, there is a lot of heartbreak though. You want the best for all these amazing characters. A book I won't forget about and will definitely return to.