Perfect Match by Jodi Picoult

 Jodi Picoult does an amazing job at showing a situation from different points of view and Perfect Match is no exception. In any story that involves a child harmed, this story tugs at the heart.

From the cover:

In the course of her everyday work, career-driven assistant district attorney Nina Frost prosecutes child molesters and works determinedly to ensure that a legal system with too many loopholes keeps these criminals behind bars. But when her own five-year-old son is traumatized by a sexual assault, Nin and her husband are shattered, ripped apart by an enraging sense of helplessness . . . Nina hurtles toward a plan to exact her own justice for her son - no matter the consequence.

The Book of Two Ways by Jodi Picoult

 

Jodi Picoult always leaves the reader with a lot to ponder. The Book of Two Ways delves into Egyptology, views of death and the role of a present day death doula.  

After a scary situation, Dawn decides to take a trip to Egypt and recover her prior life as an archeologist and also her prior love, Wyatt. She leaves behind Brian, her husband, and her vocation as a death doula. Feeling she has two paths she could chose from and wondering what she will leave behind when she leaves this earth, the novel gives an in depth look of both lives she has to choose from.

My thoughts: I've always loved Jodi Picoult's novels, but I found it difficult to wade through all the Egyptology descriptions and explanations of archeology and scientific studies. I feel that a lot of it could have been condensed without losing the story. It's also difficult to understand the timeline as it isn't written chronologically.  Kirkus review of The Book of Two Ways had similar comments.

Harvesting the Heart by Jodi Picoult

 I normally love Jodi Picoult's novels which show two different view points, but I found Harvesting the Heart was an extremely slow read until the end when everything was wrapped up in just a few pages. The juxtaposition was of a young married couple, she a new mother and he an up and coming heart surgeon.

From the cover:

Paige has only a few vivid memories of her mother; who abandoned her when she was five. Now, having left her father behind in Chicago, she dreams of art school, marries an ambitious doctor - and soon becomes a mother herself. Overwhelmed by the demands of having a family, Paige cannot forget her mother's absence and the shameful memories of her own past, which make her doubt both her ability to give and her sense of self-worth. 

The Pact by Jodi Picoult

 

Jodi Picoult writes about controversial subjects and The Pact, like any other book with teenage emotions, is a difficult read.

Childhood neighbors Chris and Emily were born a few months apart and had spent their days together as best friends, but when their childhood turned into the teenage years Emily began questioning how their relationship had quickly turned into more than a friendship. She wasn't ready for the physical demands that Chris thought so natural with someone he loved. The result was a tragedy and unlike Romeo and Juliet, Chris was arrested and held in prison until his trial.

Not only did the event wreck the lives of the two lovers, but also their parents who were as close as the children themselves. 

Along with  the story, the testimony of several witnesses and professional experts brought home the struggles and emotions that teenagers deal with, often without their parents understanding what is going on. It's so easy to just assume they are simply going through a fluctuation of hormones and not something that will have an everlasting effect on them and those around them.

A Spark of Light by Jodi Picoult

A Spark of Light is another controversial issue that Jodi Picoult has brought attention to - abortion. But the subject, in her hands, gives several points of view of those for and against abortion and their circumstances that led them to those views.

In a situation at a Center for Women where abortions take place, a man holds women, from all different avenues, hostage. We learn about each of the women and the gun man - not in chronological order but beginning at the later stages of the hold up and going back in hourly increments through a series of events leading up to the stand off.

One thing I did disagree with is that the crisis pregnancy centers are shown to be underhand and dishonest in trying to get women to choose life for their child. Having volunteered at a non profit crisis pregnancy center in Texas for over 20 years I have never come across this. The women counselors, nurses and staff are trained to focus on the women and their best interests. We do offer free pregnancy tests, ultrasound (not a fake one that is shown in the book) and parenting classes. We also help with diapers, formula and clothing. Of course, being pro-life, they would prefer that  a client not go through an abortion, and can offer alternatives so that she can make an informed decision, which seems to be the problem throughout the book, that these women didn't feel they had any other choice. Sometimes the girl is simply scared and doesn't want to give up their baby but doesn't see any other option. Sometimes they just want someone to care. The tragedy is that many girls come back after an abortion for someone to talk to, having regretted their decision, and even though they are told by many that abortion will make the "problem" go away, a secret abortion means that they grieve alone and with no one to tell.

By the way, I don't agree with the horrendous grotesque placards held by people standing outside abortion clinics to scare girls from going there. Bullying is never acceptable and a bully may be the reason the girl is there in the first place. These girls need love and kindness.

Small Great Things by Jodi Picoult

Jodi Picoult is a master at showing two sides of a story and Small Great Things was a great choice for our book club read.
Ruth Jefferson, an African American labor and delivery nurse with twenty years experience, is asked not to attend to a newborn whose parents are white supremacists. Unfortunately, she is put in a position where she is in attendance when the child dies and the parents immediately want justice because they believe she must have been at fault.
Race conflicts are not only between races but among the races themselves. Jodi Picoult points out through her story that there are entitled white people, white supremacists and neo-nazis who follow Adolf Hitler and in the black community there are people who embrace the black culture and those, like Ruth, who are lighter in color and try to fit in with the professional white community.
Turk, the father of the baby who died, has learned to hate, first with his father and then his father-in-law who leads men into violently accosting anyone who is different. 
Tying it all together is Kennedy McQuarrie a white public defender who learns that even though her client works hard, dresses well and has had a good education, she is still followed around a department store by employees with a view that because she is black she may be a thief. Ruth herself has had a complicated life with an unlikely friendship with a rich family because her mother was their maid for over 50 years and she often played with their child.
Ruth and Kennedy develop a friendship through the trial proceedings and each learn about each other and the struggles they have on both sides of the fence.
It's an emotional story and my thoughts after reading the book is that we should be kinder and have more empathy for each other - whether we are alike or different shouldn't matter.

Justice will not be served until those who are unaffected are as outraged as though who are. Benjamin Franklin.

Leaving Time by Jodi Picoult

In each of Jodi Picoult's novels, she takes the reader on a journey and Leaving Time is no different from her other stories. Although the novel is fiction, most of the elephant stories are true and she obviously has a passion for their demise through poaching and carelessness of those who have little value for life.

From the cover:
For more than a decade, Jenna Metcalf has never stopped thinking about her mother, Alice, who mysteriously disappeared in the wake of a tragic accident. Refusing to believe she was abandoned, Jenna searches for her mother regularly online and pores over pages of Alice's old journals. A scientist who studied grief among elephants, Alice wrote mostly of her research among the animals she loved, yet Jenna hopes the entries will provide a clue to her mother's whereabouts. Desperate to find the truth, Jenna enlists two unlikely allies in her quest: Serenity Jones, a psychic and Virgil Stanhope, the jaded private detective who originally investigated Alice's case.

My thoughts:
Jodi Picoult doesn't write in conventional chapters, but rather juggles the thoughts of various characters which gives the reader insight into different views of the situation, As with all her books, Ms. Picoult has done extensive research to give the reader a glimpse into the life of Alice and her husband who are both conducting elephant research. At times, I found myself skipping over some of the information about elephant behavior. Serenity is the complete opposite of the researchers and clues Jenna in on the spirits of those who have died and what to expect from them. Between the scientist and the psychic, it gives the reader two completely polar views of the story. The ending is totally unexpected and shows what a crafted writer Ms. Picoult is.

The Storyteller by Jodi Picoult

Jodi Picoult tackles controversial and difficult subjects in her novels and The Storyteller is no exception. There are several narrators that bind the story together: A young Jewish girl whose grief and scars make her choose a solitary job as a baker, working through the night with little interaction with others; A caring man whom people have grown to like and whom they feel sorry for after his wife passes, but he also has scars of a different kind. Interspersed are stories of the past and of Germany where German soldiers are feared and Jews disappear.

Inspired by Simon Wiesenthal's book The Sunflower, Jodi Picoult delved into her emotionally grueling research for her book The Storyteller. You can read more about her research and reasons for writing the book here.

My thoughts:
Jodi Picoult is an amazing writer, she sets the stage well and not only lets the reader envision the surroundings, but also the smells and emotions in each of her stories. But this one I found difficult to read, not because of the writing but because of the content. She met with many holocaust survivors and has recounted some of their stories using a fictional character. The descriptions of heinous acts were detailed and gruesome and although I appreciated that these all added to our understanding of the characters, it was very hard to read without feeling a range of disturbing emotions. To be honest I stopped reading, three quarters of the way through the book.