Good To a Fault

The last temptation is the greatest treason
    To do the right deed for the wrong reason.


T.S. Elliot Murder in the Cathedral


So when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you give to the needy, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your giving may be in secret. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.


Matthew 6:2-4

Number 4 of 5 in Canada Reads 2010 is Marina Endicott's offering.  

This book was sold on the nature of good deeds and of selflessness.  The theme is pasted as big as the title inside and outside the cover.  It's a huge challenge to write about and one of the central themes of sin, but in the text there isn't really any conflict of the sort.  The main character is completely sympathetic, she takes in a family of three children, partly because she feels responsible and partly because having a newfound family is profoundly life affirming for a very lonely woman.  When the children's mother recovers from a near-fatal bout of the Big C, Clary feels horribly as the children she has grown to love over several months instantly disappear from her life forever, and harbors mean feelings towards their actual parents for all of 5 minutes.  

Very early in her story, a mean church lady tells Clary her good deed doesn't count because she's just grandstanding.  Although this eats at the protagonist the whole novel, from the reader's perspective it's never the case and therein lies where the book is lacking.  This gal doesn't have a malicious bone in her body.  She is doing the right things for the right reasons and suffers heartbreak when her job is made redundant.  On top of it all, one of the children, the baby, has spent so much time with her that they've bonded the way babies and mothers do, so the reader instantly forgives Clary's moment of weakness even when she doesn't, because every parent knows exactly how horrible a feeling that must be.  The story is very pretty and pretty sad, particularly when told through the eldest daughter's perspective, but the characters never really move out of the first dimension.  It reads like Club Soda tastes.  I liked it, but it took me longer than I figured to finish it.