The Bean Trees

Though I have only read the first chapter, I king of like the book but as it develops my true feelings for it will become apparent, but for now all I can say is that I kind of like it. The book begins with the narrator, Missy, telling of her boring life in rural Pittman County, Kentucky. She describes the story of Newt Hardbine's father in which he came deaf. She knows that it will be her or Newt Hardbine to be the one who gets away. The story continues as Missy describes her life in her high school. Unlike many girls in the area, Missy decides to avoid pregnancy which is when I begin to gain respect for her because the easy thing for her to do in the situation would be to have a baby and get married, but she decides to take a stand. Missy then gets a job working at a hospital and with the money she earns from her job, she buys a Volkswagen and begins her descent from Pittman. I honor the fact that Missy worked for what she wanted. She made it a goal to leave Pittman and she worked to achieve it which is very respectable. Missy then changes her name to Taylor because she ends up running of gas in Taylorville. I believe she also does this to give herself a new beginning in her life. Taylor's car next breaks down in the Cherokee Nation in Oklahoma. After visiting the bar, a woman follows her to her car and puts a baby in the passenger seat. As Taylor drives off, she cannot tell whether the baby is a boy or girl and stops at a motel and convinces the guard to let her stay for free. In her room she gives the baby a bath and sees that it is a girl and that she has been badly bruised and sexually abused. At this point, Taylor decides that she will take care of the baby.

I hope that the baby does not get in the way of Taylor's goals and hopefully she will be able to manage both. The first chapter was pretty action-packed in which I gain a lot of respect of Taylor as a character. I am looking foward to seeing how she deals with the baby and keeping her own goals in mind at the same time.