Customer Reviews

Domestic Arrangements

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In reading her two novels "Domestic Arrangements" and "Give Me One Good Reason" I found Klein to be a generally talented writer.

She writes in a style that minimizes drama--perhaps even making it seem as if her characters lack an ability to possess deeper emotions. Her characters' lives are not too unusually different from an average Jane Doe's--at least it shouldn't make that much of a difference (which is what I suspect the author is trying to say).

Within the context of these slightly unusual situations--a single woman planning a pregnancy which will systematically seclude the bisexual father from the baby's life ("Give me...") and a fourteen year old girl baring it for a movie roll and having sex with her parents' (at least her mom's) blessing ("Domestic...")--Klein tries to portray the reality of her characters. Amidst these complications, her characters are struggling with your more normal problems: falling in love, growing up, coming to terms with your parent's divorce, etc. With Klein's low-key almost nonchalant style of writing, it's not too difficult to relate to the characters or their situations. In her own way, she succeed in delivering the message that strange things happen to normal people-- and unfortunate things, to normal families.

I remember reading this in 8th grade - i loved it so much i photocopied it from the library. The nice thing about this book is that although Tatiana was so different from me or from any of my friends, I could totally identify with what she was feeling - especially her utter confusion in the grown-up world. Though this isn't a suspensenovel, I was surprised every page, by the delicate and unique emotions of the characters - they were astounded by common things and calm during turbulent events - yet you could understand them. The book brought different blends of emotions to the world of teenage literature. Very much reccomended

This is another novel in the category of the "young teens fall in love and have sex too soon without consequences". On the plus side, the characterizations and humorous scenes are better than the ones found in Judy Blume's "Forever". On the minus side, Norma Klein does not really explore the issue of responsible sex in any serious way. She simply has her leading character, a 14-year-old dazzling redheaded girl with the nickname of "Rusty", ask her parents for a diaphragm as a Christmas gift. Yes, really.

This novel, like "Forever", also begins with an attention-grabbing chapter, but Klein doesn't blatantly attempt to hook the reader with the first sentence. Tatiana Engelberg, aka Rusty, states that "Daddy was LIVID at breakfast". By the time we get around to discovering the reason, which she puts quite bluntly, we realize that this is indeed a steamy sex novel that somehow got categorized as a YA simply because the character is 14 years old. Tatiana is unintentionally amusing because in spite of her sexual experience and poise, she is a wide-eyed innocent in her personality. She is always upfront and tries to be tactful, since she is sensitive and worries about hurting people's feelings. Her sister, Deel, for instance, is harsh and constantly puts her down, but the reason for that becomes apparent as soon as Rusty's parents are introduced. Their favoritism of Tatiana is so painfully obvious that Delia can't help but feel left out.

The novel is fine when Klein sticks to portraying Rusty's family, who are decidedly a whimsical bunch, guaranteed to drive each other crazy. Her father, Lionel, is a serious, stern idealist with such a strong fixation for Rusty that there's a nearly incestuous undertone to their relationship, which is downright creepy during the scenes when they discuss Rusty's sex life. The mother, Amanda, is the direct opposite: a "Peter Pan" woman who never grew up, who hated her gawky teen years, and wants to relive them through Tatiana by being excessively permissive. Delia, as mentioned, is the bitter older sister, the "plain" one who's not as pretty or smart as Tatiana, and is constantly reminded of it.

The realism of Tat's eccentric family injects a spark in the novel that her relationship with her boyfriend, Joshua, lacks. True, Tatiana and Joshua have their "love" and "hate" phases, and often quarrel, but it's relatively inconsequential and almost always involves some "big misunderstanding". It's "Three's Company" meets "90210". Also, Rusty and Joshua often fall into the "Judy Blume" trap of analyzing sex to death (how many times do we have to hear about female orgasms?). Still, they do seem to share a genuine friendship and are a more believable couple than the sketchy "Katherine" and "Michael" from "Forever".

Klein's fatal mistake is to inject a completely unnecessary ingredient into the mix: stardom. In Chapter 4, Rusty mentions in a "by the way" aside that she just starred in a movie about a young seductive nymphet and bared her breasts to boot. This is no doubt one of the "good parts" a young teen looks for, but it completely throws off the story, which had been moving along steadily up to that point. Suddenly, the novel is about Tat's movie, her stardom, and her embarrassment over being touted as the "new Brooke Shields". Yeah, yeah, go cry in someone else's coffee, honey.

The irony of the "movie" plot is that it brings nothing to the story. Adults will enjoy the dialogue between Amanda and Lionel, who are such a mismatched pair that one wonders where the attraction was in the first place. Younger teens will read for the byplay between Tatiana and Joshua. However, the only relevant element in the "stardom" angle was Tatiana's sad realization that she's a mere sex commodity in the movie business, rather than the intelligent, sensuous actress that her reviews would indicate. Everything else--the "jealousy" themes and so forth--could have been done without making Rusty a teen movie queen. It's a silly waste of a plot. It's also quite bothersome the way that not only Rusty, but her parents, show very little responsibility when it comes to Rusty's sexual relationship. Her father demands abstinence from Rusty after the fact, although he would condone his older daughter (age 16) "going all the way" even though she has no steady boyfriend! Amanda, of course, provides Tat with the "key to the kingdom" and even goes out of her way to turn her home into a hotel "while Lionel's away". In general, she behaves like a rebellious child in order to bond with her daughter. She remains immature and flighty to the end. Nevertheless, I'm sure most people will find this novel far more entertaining than the bland "stick figure" characters in "Forever".