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One True Thing
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Plot Summary of One True Thing
"Ellen, a successful magazine writer living in New York City, is happy with her job and her life. However, when Ellen's mother gets cancer and doesn't have long to live, Ellen's father asks Ellen to come home and care for her mother. When Ellen suggests hiring a nurse, Ellen's father tells her that she has no heart. Ellen moves back home to please her father. When her mother realizes she has moved back home, she is horrified that Ellen gave up her job and her life to take care of her, and Ellen realizes her father didn't consult her mother about this. Ellen tells her mother that it's okay, even though she doesn't feel okay.

Ellen finds her day-to-day life tedious. However, Ellen comes to realize that she is grateful she was able to spend time with her mother and get to know her better.

As Ellen watches her mother deteriorate and become full of despair, she wishes she could alleviate her mother's pain and suffering, but when her mother pleads with Ellen to end it for her, Ellen cannot do it. Ironically, the autopsy of Ellen's mother shows a fatal overdose of morphine. Ellen is taken to the police station and questioned, then arrested. Ellen thinks her father gave her mother the fatal dose, but Ellen never mentions this to anyone. "
Crystal, Resident Scholar

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Anna Quindlen Resident Scholar Profiles

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