The Beet Queen

I read The Beet Queen because Allie's grandfather asked me if I had heard about it or read it. It was an interesting book that spanned the majority of a family members lives each chapter being from a different characters point of view. It started with 3 children having their mother leave them. 2 took a from Minneapolis to North Dakota the other was kidnapped. The girl Mary lived with her aunt and uncle. The boy left his sister and because a traveling salesman. The youngest brother because a priest in Minneapolis. Mary seemed to have a negative impact on the lives of her extended family and their friends. She ended up taking over her aunt and uncles meat business. Her cousin lost her best friend to Mary, did not like getting dirty, took no part in the family business, became a model, on her own she started a restaurant that failed, had a store that failed, had one marriage that she was never happy in so it failed, she went insane and would net speak, her second husband died, and she killed herself shortly after. Mary's stolen friend ended up pregnant from Mary's brother Karl. Karl left and was not there for the child, however Mary very much was. Sometimes even too much for the child's mother. Another important character who poked his head in from time to time was Wallace. He was Karl's other lover, the one who delivered Dot, another failed father figure, and the one who brought sugar beets to North Dakota. This changed the town and brought in big business. Wallace was unmarried and was instead very involved in the community. So in order to make up his failings to Dot he set up a beet celebration and rigged the voting to allow Dot to become the beet queen. Everyone knew or thought they knew that he rigged this, Dot was mad and as a result it was yet another failing of him as a parent. Failure seemed to be a common theme of this book. Lots of parents failing their children and how even when the parents did not fail their child, Sita was arguably less successful than Mary or Karl.

Overall this was an interesting read but definitely not my favorite. It did however spark my interest in reading more novels about the mid-west and from local authors.