A perusal of MERRIAM WEBSTER'S COLLEGIATE DICTIONARY is enlightening on the subject.
Five are believed to have come into existence before the 12th century: "stepmother," "stepfather," "stepchild," "stepdaughter" and "stepson." Two appear to have found their way into language in the 15th century: "stepbrother" and "stepsister." One appeared circa 1890: "stepparent." However, it was not until 1966 that "stepfamily" found its way into the dictionary. Today, the dynamics of family life have evolved to such an unlikely stage that all these words are used matter-of-factly by children and adults alike. We may not know exactly when they fell into common usage, but we do know what they mean --- both as words and as experiences.
In her newest novel, Joanna Trollope tackles the subject of stepfamilies with the same deft hand apparent in all her fine work. Anyone who has ever been a stepchild, or had one, or suffered through the adjustment of a stepparent, or been one, will find emotional truths ringing in their ears throughout the reading of OTHER PEOPLE'S CHILDREN.
The novel opens with the wedding of Josie and Matthew --- a wedding attended by friends and family...and family. Josie has an eight-year-old son, Rufus, by a former marriage to Tom Carver. Matthew has three children by his marriage to Nadine, a bitter, wild-tempered woman. Rufus finds Becky, Rory and Clare positively terrifying, and they see him as a hopeless little nerd. And, of course, all the children are resistant to their new stepparents. While Josie and Matthew are deeply in love, the wedding does not seem to be boding well for the merging of these two families.
With a shift in focus that gives some breathing room from the tense atmosphere of the wedding, the next scene centers on Elizabeth Brown, a single woman contemplating the purchase of a new house. Helping her visualize its potential, and unwittingly forcing her to reflect on her own loneliness, is an architect --- Tom Carver, ex-husband of Josie.
"When she had stood in the little house in Lansbury Crescent that morning, she had been able to visualize her solitude there, but not the scene that Tom had suggested, of a summer evening, with the garden door open and a tray of drinks on a table on the patio, and a group of friends. She had friends, of course she did, friends she went to the cinema and theater with, friends who asked her round for Sunday lunch and failed to fool her, for a moment, despite their loud comical wails of complaint, about the deep proud satisfaction they felt in having children. You could --- and she had other single friends who did this --- make friends into a kind of family, but in the end your separateness awaited you, not so much in your empty flat as in your heart."
This is the crux of this compelling novel: separateness, and the heartbreak and diligence it takes to mold that into the togetherness of a family. Trollope has the enviable knack of being able to take an ordinary subject and elevate it to the extraordinary with the soul-searching power of her finely tuned writer's eye.
Nowhere is this feeling of separateness more apparent than in the now single-parent family of Becky, Clare and Rory. Their mother, Nadine, is so bitter about her divorce that she refuses to touch the money received from her settlement or to find steady work, instead relegating herself and her children to life in a veritable hovel, with daily haranguing on her suffering and the evilness of the man who brought her to it. Nadine is a disturbing character; it's almost painful to read of her eccentricities and the extremes of mood she regularly inflicts on her children, who are so fearful of putting one foot wrong that they are especially nasty to her supposed adversary, Josie.
For her part, Josie is caught between a husband trying to appease his own guilt and three stepchildren intent on showing her that they are loyal to their mother. To make matters worse for Josie, she has to worry about her own son, Rufus, and his reaction to Matthew, his new stepfather.
Rufus is battling stepfamilies on another front as well. His father, the architect Tom Carver, has two grown children --- Dale and Lucas --- from an earlier marriage and they are not taking it well that Tom is seriously interested in Elizabeth Brown. Dale, an obsessively possessive daughter, was a thorn in the side of Rufus as he was growing up and is now intent on continually pricking Elizabeth, who has dared to enter Tom's life. Lucas is dealing not only with his relationship with Dale, but also with the woman he wants to marry. The only good thing that Rufus can see is that he and Elizabeth take to each other immediately.
It's as complicated as it sounds, but imminently more interesting and very readable. OTHER PEOPLE'S CHILDREN is a wild ride of the expectations, let-downs, compromises, failures and successes inherent in forging stepfamilies. Trollope is particularly good at depicting the confusion and contrariness of the children as they attempt to carve out their own places in the new family structures. She also delves into the other points of view with openness, empathy and humor --- what it's like to be a well-meaning parent trying desperately to shape one family unit out of disparate, thorny parts...and what it's like to be a woman teetering on the brink of a marriage that could mean falling straight into the briar patch.
Trollope is never boring or predictable. She gets to the heart of her characters and paints their frailties with the same loving strokes as their strengths. She imbues touchy subjects with a soothing gilt of normality while at the same time molding the most ordinary of topics into wonderfully provocative portraits of modern life. Joanna Trollope truly makes us feel --- gut-level --- what it's like to be raising OTHER PEOPLE'S CHILDREN.
--- Reviewed by Jami Edwards
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