For those who have read and seen White Oleander?

I'm not being lazy but I cannot finish reading White Oleander. It is FAR too depressing and I have to compare/contrast the film and book. The film is better because there aren't any detailed sexual episodes between Astrid and anyone else but in the book there is. It angers/saddens me that this has to happen to a 14 year old girl. I myself have had similar things happen to me and I do not want to finish this or else I will kill myself, seriously. So if anyone has read the book and watched the movie, some information will be helpful. Thanks

For those who have read and seen White Oleander?
The novel is set in modern California. When the story begins, Astrid is twelve years old. She and her beloved mother, poet Ingrid Magnussen, live a sheltered life together, with little male influence. Ingrid was left by her husband Klaus Anders before Astrid was old enough to remember; Astrid has never seen or spoken to her father since then. Astrid, like her mother, is beautiful. She relies solely on Ingrid and has trouble fitting in at school. From the beginning, Ingrid appears to be a caring mother, but the reader also sees that she is self-centered and somewhat cold-hearted. Above all, Ingrid lives by the maxim "Never let a man stay the night."





However, Ingrid breaks her rules with a man named Barry Kolker who was initially not her type. Astrid watches as Ingrid and Barry become more and more involved, then she witnesses her mother's heartbreak when he is revealed to be a horrendous womanizer. Ingrid poisons Barry with the juice of a white oleander. She is charged with his murder and sentenced to over thirty years in prison. She promises her daughter that she will come back, but this doesn't happen. So begins Astrid's journey through a series of foster homes, where she encounters a variety of worlds and people.





The first foster family is that of Starr, a former stripper and drug addict. She has two children of her own, Carolee and Davey, as well as a boyfriend, Ray. Despite a culture that is rough around the edges, Starr could be labeled a "trailer park" Christian. This home, which seems different although suitable at first, is the first of many failures. Despite being fifteen years old, Astrid has an affair with Starr's fifty year old boyfriend, Ray. Suspicious and needy, Starr converts back to her old habit of heavy drinking. One night, after loudly accusing Ray of having sex with the foster child, Starr turns a gun on Astrid.





Although suffering some broken bones and stitches from the shot, Astrid is not fatally injured, and after recovery, her next home is with the Turlocks. Ed and Marvel are an average, cold couple, the parents of two young children. In their home, Astrid becomes an unpaid babysitter. While taking the kids to the park, she begins to smoke marijuana (likely a reminder of Ray) which she bought by trading sexual favors with local teenagers. As an escape from Marvel's wrath, Astrid befriends the Turlocks' next-door neighbour, a beautiful African-American woman named Olivia Johnstone. Astrid admires Olivia's beauty and her hedonistic lifestyle, although she knows that Olivia, as a woman of complete independence, will never think the same of her. Olivia is a prostitute by profession and is hated by the Turlock family. One night Astrid snuck out of the Turlock house to see if Olivia was home but was attacked by dogs on the way there, leaving her with scars. Astrid's association with Olivia leads to her being expelled from the Turlock household after accidently falling asleep at Olivia's house one night.





Next, Astrid ends up in the home of a Hispanic woman named Amelia Ramos. Amelia is an interior designer, originally from Argentina, and lives in Hollywood, with a huge, elegant house. Amelia has a son, but unfortunately, he has AIDS and the girls don't see him much. The other foster girls in the house are all Latino and are racist towards Astrid. Besides being a white girl, she has pale skin, light blue eyes, and white-blonde hair. However, all the girls in Amelia's household are treated the same. They are fed dinner, but for the most part, Amelia keeps a lock on her fridge, so they starve in the mornings. She even recommends a friend to take in girls, because they are "easy money." Astrid starves to the point that she stops menstruating. She resorts to eating unfinished lunches from the garbage at school. Finally, with the help of a social worker, she is removed from Amelia's household.





With the next family, Astrid's fate seems to change. She becomes the companion of a lonely young woman, Claire Richards, an actress with a workaholic husband, Ron. Loving but weak, Claire does everything she can to ensure Astrid's comfort. For once, Astrid has a regular schedule, is doing well in school and pursuing the art she loves. All the while, Astrid continues corresponding with her mother in prison, but Astrid becomes increasingly bitter towards Ingrid. She settles easily into life with Claire. With Ron, however, this fate takes a turn that will ultimately be tragic. Ron is, perhaps, a well-meaning man, but he is as neglectful of Claire as she is obsessive over him. Claire suspects that Ron is having an affair, because of his frequent trips which he claims are for business purposes. Astrid watches their fights grow worse and as Ron makes constant trips away from home. Claire falls deeper and deeper into depression. Claire also communicates with Ingrid, whom she admires greatly, and Ingrid convinces her that Ron is indeed having an affair, although she hardly knows Claire or Ron. Later, Ingrid tells Astrid that deceiving Claire is too easy, "like drowning kittens." At Christmas, Claire commits suicide by overdosing and taking pills. This leaves Astrid stuck with Ron. Ron lets Astrid stay, but Astrid declines and decides she'd be better off in an orphanage of sorts, MacLaren Children's Center (known as Mac), than with him.





Astrid meets a boy named Paul in the children's center, and when they become friends (much to Astrid's opposition at first, due to the fact that she wanted to be reclusive) people start speculating that they are a couple and mocking them.





Astrid's final home is with Russian immigrant Rena Grushenka. She intentionally chose Rena over better prospective foster parents because she is devastated by Claire's death, and does not want to become part of a "normal" nuclear family. At Rena's, she befriends two other girls, the punker Niki, and pregnant, needy Yvonne. As a reflection of her first foster home, she ends up sleeping with Rena's boyfriend, Sergei (although Astrid is in her last year of high school by this point).





Meanwhile, Ingrid has begun to build up a following of fans and admirers from prison, who all believe she is innocent. Ingrid and her lawyer begin to build up a case to get Ingrid released from prison. However, their case depends on Astrid -- if she testifies that Ingrid did not murder Barry, Ingrid would probably get out, but if she testifies the truth, Ingrid could not win her case. Astrid realizes that she is in a position of power over her mother, and tells her that unless she answers some of her questions, she will testify against her.





Astrid learns a lot about her past, including an incident when, as a very small child, she was left in the care of a neighbor named Annie for a year, while her mother abandoned her to live in Ensenada. She also learns about her father, Klaus Anders. She receives word from her mother's admirers and advocates, who are convinced that Ingrid is innocent. Knowing her mother is guilty, Astrid refuses to testify at first, but is soon convinced to lie to help free Ingrid. However, when the case is brought up, Ingrid tells the court that she refuses to let Astrid speak on her behalf, even if she must carry out her long sentence. From this, Astrid knows that her mother is not all selfishness, and does bear true love for her.





In the end, Astrid moves to Berlin with her boyfriend, Paul, who has now become a comic book artist like he had dreamed of in the foster home. She continues to create art and even visits her birth father Klaus. One night Paul returns with a newspaper stating that Ingrid was released from prison after winning her new trial. Astrid struggles internally with the power that her mother still has over her and secretly dreams of going back to California. Life is not perfect, and Astrid has been very much damaged, but she has overcome many trials.