Reviews with content warning for Sexual assault - Orphan Train

Seemed a lot like misery open to me. I found a lot of things to be contrived and unrealistic. I am grateful that I read it before giving it as a gift to the person I had intended to.

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vhewittreads's review

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emotional sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No

3.5

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shannonredwine8's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional hopeful reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

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elaineh7's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging emotional hopeful inspiring medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.75

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davya_joy's review

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dark emotional inspiring fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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sakusha's review

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dark emotional mysterious reflective sad

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

Nice novel which weaves together the stories of a modern goth Native American foster girl named Molly and an old lady named Vivian who was an Irish orphan in her own childhood. Overall I liked the book, but I have some minor complaints (page numbers are from the wide print version):

I didn’t like that the author seemed to include her political bias into the story. The first example is the character Dina, who she made out to be conservative and completely negative with no positive traits. Dina was racist (206), always complaining, ate unhealthy and tried to force her eating habits on Molly, didn’t seem to want a foster kid at all, and seemed stressed out and burdened by Molly’s presence despite Molly not really doing anything to stress or burden her. Terry is a similar always-grumpy-for-no-reason character (148-150).

In fact, it seems like a common thing in this story for the women to be like this (Mary and Mrs. Byrne were the same way), while their husbands (if present) are meek and timid, or as the book calls the orphan train man: milquetoast (seems to be the old fashioned word for “beta”). One man who isn’t a milquetoast is Mr. Grote, but he’s a far right conservative who the author obviously doesn’t think fondly of either; he’s so determined to be self-sufficient that he’s content to live in poverty and squalor (198-201).

Molly herself is a grumpy, dominant, independent woman too! All the nice women (like Vivian and Miss Larsen) in the story have something in common: they don’t have kids. This probably shows the author’s secret belief that women who have a lot (like two or more) of kids are ignorant and disgusting. At the same time it inadvertently shows that it’s people without kids who think they know how to raise them right, without having any experience to back up their beliefs.

Miss Larsen is clearly the author’s idea of the perfect woman: pretty, lively, smiling, smells nice, greets children by name, willing to call children by their preferred name, remembers birthdays, gives gifts (195-201), compliments the kids, says she missed them, encourages girls to be independent (232), offers to listen to their home life problems (236), bends down and looks kids in the eye when she talks to them (positive discipline books recommend doing this, but my own kid says she doesn’t care, and I personally find this behavior to be condescending). “You’d think with all these kids it would be chaotic, but Miss Larsen rarely raises her voice” (197). This is that naive idealism leftists seem to have about kids (and I used to have as well). The reality is most kids are not well behaved, and speaking to unruly ones with friendliness and patience just encourages them to walk all over you. Contrasting Vivian’s terrible home environment with the cheery school one (235) also shows the common leftist opinion that schools do a better job raising kids than parents do.

Another sign of the author’s leftism is how she points out the superiority of Native Americans to Europeans when it came to agriculture. “No, they weren’t ‘primitive’—their social networks were highly advanced” (213). I think what everyone means by “primitive” has nothing to do with social networks. Yeah, cavemen had social networks too. So what? Did the Native Americans have skyscrapers, guns, ships, books, and paved roads? No, they didn’t. So yes, by “civilized” standards, the natives were primitive. And of course they knew agriculture, because that was their way of life. The “civilized” Europeans were unfamiliar with the land and the food being grown, even the whites who were farmers in Europe. If you plopped the Native Americans down in Europe and told them to grow some crop they had never seen in their life, they wouldn’t be experts at it either.

Hey, Ms. Baker Kline (the double barrel surname is another leftist sign)! Mr. Grote is just like the Native Americans! Not primitive! Because he knows how to hunt and grow food, unlike city slickers! Ah, but let’s find some excuse to differentiate Mr. Grote from the Natives. He has no tribe. And he’s white. So living like a native must be unforgivable. Whites are supposed to be perfect in every way, civilized and at the same time accepting of all the flaws of other cultures while possessing none of those flaws themselves. Leftist hypocrisy.

The author includes a class discussion on Native Americans. She has a kid say typical things the left accuses the right of saying: “You lost. Deal with it. Don’t ask for handouts” (268-269). The teacher implies they aren’t asking for handouts. Natives, no, but the blacks sure are (reparations), and they probably wouldn’t even have the idea in their head if leftists hadn’t put it there to try to get their votes (people in MLK’s time weren’t asking for reparations, just equal opportunity and no segregation). The fact of the matter is that groups of people have warred with and oppressed others throughout human history, and that every piece of land on the planet was likely stolen from some other person (or animal!). It’s impossible to know what caveman every piece of land originally belonged to. And the people who suffered are long dead anyway, so their living ancestors today don’t deserve to make amends for things that happened in ancient history. Equal opportunity is the best and fairest thing to do. Be respectful of all. Don’t do any stealing *today,* and forgive whatever stealing happened in the past by people long dead. Bringing up old thefts and oppressions and suggesting reparations just keeps racism and entitlement and inequality alive, and starts new resentments.

I found some things in the novel unrealistic (spoilers below):

Vivian asks Molly why she hasn’t looked for her birth mother (140), which doesn’t make sense given Vivian hasn’t looked for any of her living relatives either.

Vivian was molested, yet the day she sees her old friend Dutchy again, she is ready to have sex with him (362). This is unrealistic because of her traumatic experience with sex, and also because having sex outside of marriage was not common back then, especially not for someone of Vivian’s personality type (reserved, modest, obedient).

Dutchy is supportive of Vivian finishing college (370).

Vivian’s friend is against her husband going to war and calls the war stupid (373). I think most Americans were supportive of the war back then. Men enlisting was seen not only as duty, but also an honor to be proud of. Antiwar sentiment didnt start until Vietnam in the 60s. The author probably knew this, but she pushed her politics on the characters again.

Vivian has a baby with Dutchy, and then gives it away (386)! Useful for the plot, I suppose, but so unrealistic! For one, why would a well off orphan woman want to subject her child to being an orphan too?! Secondly, her love Dutchy just died, and she wants to get rid of their child! That child should be considered a precious gift even more so after the father died!

Things I could relate to:

“[Molly] knows full well what it’s like to tamp down your natural inclinations, to force a smile when you feel numb. After a while you don’t know what your own needs are anymore. You’re grateful for the slightest hint of kindness, and then, as you get older, suspicious. Why would anyone do anything for you without expecting something in return? And anyway—most of the time they don’t. More often than not, you see the worst of people. You learn that most adults lie. That most people only look out for themselves. that you are only as interesting as you are useful to someone. And so your personality is shaped. You know too much, and this knowledge makes you wary. You grow fearful and mistrustful. The expression of emotion does not come naturally, so you learn to fake it. To pretend. To display an empathy you don’t actually feel. And so it is that you learn how to pass, if you’re lucky, to look like everyone else, even though you’re broken inside” (267).

“One time, not long before the fire, [Mother] was curled on her bed in the dark and I heard her crying and went in to comfort her. When I put my arms around her, she sprang up, flinging me away. ‘You don’t care about me,’ she snapped. ‘Don’t pretend you do. You only want your supper.’ I shrank back, my face flaming as if I’d been struck. And in that moment something changed. I didn’t trust her anymore. When she cried, I felt numb. After that, she called me heartless, unfeeling. And maybe I was” (227-228).

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nathalieisg's review

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emotional mysterious sad fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.5

A well written, emotional book that tugs at your heart strings. The only reason I'm not giving it a higher rating is because I found the story a bit cliché. I feel like any book that involves orphans, WWII and adoption follows a very predictable trajectory.

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