What's Eating Gilbert Grape by Peter Hedges

What's Eating Gilbert Grape by Peter Hedges
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Time taken to read - 3 days

Pages - 319

Publisher - Simon & Schuster

Source - Bought

Blurb from Goodreads

Just about everything in Endora, Iowa (pop. 1,091 and dwindling) is eating Gilbert Grape, a twenty-four-year-old grocery clerk who dreams only of leaving. His enormous mother, once the town sweetheart, has been eating nonstop ever since her husband's suicide, and the floor beneath her TV chair is threatening to cave in. Gilbert's long-suffering older sister, Amy, still mourns the death of Elvis, and his knockout younger sister has become hooked on makeup, boys, and Jesus--in that order, but the biggest event on the horizon for all the Grapes is the eighteenth birthday of Gilbert's younger brother, Arnie, who is a living miracle just for having survived so long. As the Grapes gather in Endora, a mysterious beauty glides through town on a bicycle and rides circles around Gilbert, until he begins to see a new vision of his family and himself.


My Review

So I know this is a movie with Johnny Depp and a very young Leonardo DiCaprio, I don't think I have seen it but little bits, I recognised the bath scene. The main character is Gilbert Grape, 24 years old, living in a small town and quite angry and over the hand life has given him. Going through the motions until a young lassie appears on her bike and captures Gilbert's attention and seeing his life through new eyes.

I can't say Gilbert is a nice character, he is a bit of a tool, not a great pal nor brother although he does have his moments with Arnie, his miracle brother the doctors had told would never make his 18th birthday. As Arnie's birthday gets closer the family make big plans for the monumental achievement. Amidst this we meet Gilbert's mother, once the town sweetheart and now hugely overweight and stays indoors 24/7 to keep from ridicule and gossip. Two older siblings who managed to escape, his older sister who lives at home and his younger sister who is a bit high maintenance, Elvis loving and newly finding the attraction to/of boys.

The book covers a whole host of dynamics, relationships, issues, some of the language is not used nowadays (Arnie is referred to as the derogatory R word multiple times). I know some people love this book, I wasn't one of them, I don't hate it but maybe I just didn't get what the author was shooting for? There was a scene I did gasp at and I felt for the wean but a lot of the time I was really annoyed at the characters behaviours and choices. Maybe that is indeed what Hedges was going for, imperfect characters, imperfect life, unlikable but with some redeeming qualities or moments, 3/5.

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