Flax’s endless string of affairs has clearly affected Charlotte’s psyche in a really unhealthy way, but she’s not intentionally abusive. Flax dote on Kate, who ties them together into a family unit. Charlotte’s not thrilled about the situation, but she’s also a teen and that tends to go along with moping. Flax, the family’s actually fairly loving overall. She has a picture of his shoes and hopes to identify him this way (lol, gurl, not happening).įor all the tension between Charlotte and Mrs. Also unsurprising is that Charlotte has some daddy issues. At the same time, though, Charlotte’s actually got a lot in common with her mother, and even feels jealous of her mother’s popularity. Her little asides about saints are hilarious and, oh my, how I can picture Winona Ryder being perfection at this. Charlotte’s the latter sort, only, for her, rebelling means religion, high-necked dresses, and a desire to become a saint (even though her family is Jewish).

Children tend, most often to admire their parents and want to be like them or to want to be the total opposite. Flax, which is what she calls her all the time. Unsurprisingly, Charlotte holds a lot of resentment for Mrs. The family moves constantly, whenever Mrs. She’s a single parent, with two girls, Charlotte and Kate, both with different fathers. The Flaxes are a dysfunctional family (is there any other kind?) headed by Mrs. Mostly, it was actually a pretty normal YA plotline, not that YA really existed back in the day, when I guess this must have been the shortest adult novel ever, since I don’t imagine it would have been given to children. Though I haven’t seen the movie, this is the perfect cast for this book, which ought to tell you something. Flax, the wild mother, Winona Ryder as the older daughter, and Christina Ricci as the younger daughter. Dann has created a young girl who accepts the unkindness of the mad universe in which she's whirling and takes it on with a savage glee.Ĭharlotte Flax is like no one you have ever met-and someone you know very well.įor more reviews, Cover Snark and more, visit A Reader of Fictions.įact #3: Mermaids was made into a movie starring Cher as Mrs. She's smitten with the shy young caretaker at the convent at the top of the hill. Charlotte's main ambition in life is to become a saint, preferably martyred, though she's Jewish. Flax is a woman who wears polka-dot dresses and serves hors d'oeuvres for dinner every night, and Kate is a child who basically wants to be a fish.Īnd then there's Charlotte, who in Patty Dann's hands, is transformed into a young woman of infinite whim and variety. Flax into a sleepy 1960's Massachusetts town.

So begins this extraordinary first novel about one wild year in the life of fourteen-year-old Charlotte Flax, when she and her sister Kate move with Mrs. Flax was happiest when she was leaving a place, but I wanted to stay put long enough to fall down crazy and hear the Word of God.

Mermaids novel patty dann