FOXFIRE

Ida writes:
FOXFIRE Blog

In the book FOXFIRE by Joyce Carol Oates, Legs (Margaret Sadovsky) is sent to court because of the incident that happened at school. Her father lies to the court and says that she is out of control and doesn’t listen to him when the truth is that he’s an alcoholic and doesn’t pay attention to her. She is sentenced to a minimum of five months at Red Bank State Correctional Facility For Girls. Her FOXFIRE sisters, Goldie, Lena, Rita and Maddy are devastated and hate Legs’s father for lying to not get himself in trouble. While Legs is in Red Bank she constantly gets in trouble with the guards and she starts to realize that she isn’t as tough as she always thought she was. Every moment that she spends there she wishes she was at home with Maddy and her other FOXFIRE sister. She receives all their letters but doesn’t write back because she knows the guards will sensor them. Surprisingly, her father comes and visits her and they start to talk about Legs’s mother who had died when Legs was 10. Her father explains that Legs’s mother would get herself into all kinds of trouble and was an alcoholic who died of kidney failure. Legs does not believe him and starts to flip out and accuses him of murdering her. He doesn’t visit her after that day. After multiple times of getting punished she becomes well behaved and follows the rules. She’s finally let out on June 1, 1955 for good behavior. She is very glad to see her FOXFIRE sisters. They buy alcohol and marijuana and get high and drunk all together and have a great time. From my understanding, Legs moves into her aunt’s house because she is not allowed to stay with her father anymore. Once Legs comes out of Red Bank her “friends” try to take advantage of her and think she’ll do anything for them. The girls buy themselves a car and call it Lightning Bolt. Legs helps Maddy build up the guts to go out with a boy alone, but the night doesn’t go exactly as they planed. They also think it would be fun to rob a rich man and buy a house for themselves.

The ending was confusing to me. A lot of new characters were introduced and I didn’t exactly understand who they were or what their relation was to the story. The events toward the end weren’t as exciting as the ones in the beginning, I lost interest quickly and it was hard for me to understand what was going on. Overall I think it was a good book and I enjoyed it. I always wanted to keep reading to find out what kind of trouble the girls get into next and to see if they’ll get caught.

I would rate this book a 6. I recommend this book for girls. It was eventful and it showed me all the thrills of breaking the rules and also the outcomes. It showed me that it might be fun to break all the rules, skip school and do whatever you want but there will be severe punishments for all the actions you make. I enjoyed reading this book, although I wish the ending would have been more exciting.