Thoughts: White Oleander by Janet Fitch

Sometimes it's strange how a reading experience comes out in the end. While I read the book I thought it was good and wanted to know what would happen. When I look at it now, I think the main character was unreliable, the prose forced, the plot a series of bad experiences.

Where do my problems with Astrid, the main character, come from? She is fourteen years old. Her mother is in prison, she has a sexual affair with a man three times her age, she is shot by her first foster mother. But she doesn't seem a troubled or emotionally disturbed girl. She just moves on to her next foster family. I think that damages her credibility. No girl her age would overcome bad experiences like this, only being sad or lonely sometimes.
Well, the prose, first it engaged me but the further I got the more it slowed down the reading for me. It was overcooked, too much thought out than easily flowing out of the pen.
And the plot was constructed like I would expect from an inexperienced writer, with the climax build by yet another tragedy happening to already shaken Astrid.

All in all I cared for the book's topic but not for its execution. 2.5 stars.