Plot Summary and Review of "The Clay Girl" By Heather Tucker
The book begins in the 1960s, the readers meet Hariet Appleton, Ari for short. Ari is an eight-years-old, she came from a family of six daughters, Jennah, June, Jacquie, Jory, and Jillianne, and her (Hariet). Hariet deals with the loss of childhood, the bond of a family, and growing up. The Appleton sisters, lives have been a mess from the beginning but this time their lives have erupted. The girls must deal with chaotic and abusive lives while trying to have relationships with others. The daughters father, Vincent Appleton sexually assaulted most of them, and with his final moment of hatred he blows off his own head. She struggles with what her father’s left behind, what is left of her family, and her mother’s bad habits. Her mother misuses drugs and chooses bad men. Their mother is unable to take care of them, she failed to protect them while their father was alive, and after his death. She splits up all the girls to live with relatives. Ari gets last choice and is shipped off to live with her aunt, Mary Catherine, who her mother despises her for being a lesbian, and Ari believes she eats little girls. She gets there and figures out she is safe and loves for the first time ever. She is told that she is not the dirt she has always been told she was. She realizes she now has two families, the one she was born into and the one she has created. Her time in Cape Breton changes her from being scared, neglected, into a confident, bright ten-year-old until her mother demands she comes back because she believed she was back on her feet. She spends the rest of the time, after returning home trying to get back to her aunts where she could be child and to see her love interest, Jake again. Despite all of this when Ari gets home she surprised to realize there is a bit of home left. Theresa has married a new man who is a kind and gentle person, named Len. He owns a store where she can work making shirts. Her new stepfather and his family offers her a bit of hope since leaving Cape Breton. She is aided by sympathetic teacher and her beloved stepfather Len.
Despite the positive influence from Len her mother continues to be amess and tries to mess up her life too. She is still held back by her mother’s cruelty. Then her positivity is ripped away, Len dies and she loses hope. She has no safe place to call home anymore. She sees lose after lose. Ari moves between broken homes. Her mother moves in with another abusive man, Officer Dick Irwin. She is forced to live with them and endure their torture because of the money Len left for her. Well-being in their house she does meet some good people, her step siblings. One of her step brothers, Mikey reminded her of herself. She from then on decided that she could never leave him. She could not make him stay in that house without her. Ari realizes that leaving that hell of a home life would be harder than she thought. When Hariet turns sixteen she planned on going to her aunts but her plan starts to unravel when she wants to bring Mikey. She brings Mikey to visit them but realizes that there is no way for him to stay with her at her aunts so she decides to go back to her hell life to make sure that Mikey turns out okay and does not get hurt. She puts his needs above her own despite wanting to leave for so long. She gets brought closer to life she’s dreamed of even with all the obstacles she’s had to go through. Ari’s life does not look like it has a happy ending, and there is little doubt to meet the challenges ahead. She has given away her dreams to help her step brother but does that not mean there is no hope for her left. She has just chosen a different path the path of being able to live her adolescent life with Mikey.
The book finishes with the two of them on a train back to her mother and Irwin where there are endless possibilities (most bad) but hopefully as she grows she can change her home life situation for every child that lives in that tortuous house.
