Meanwhile, Ellie, a Philadelphia defense attorney, finds herself unhappy with her career and love relationship.  She escapes to the quiet town of Paradise, Pennsylvania to visit her aunt to sort it all out.  Her peace doesn’t last long as she finds herself not only defending Katie, but also acting as her guardian by living with her 24/7 on the family dairy farm.

Taking on this case is a challenge.  Ellie finds herself defending a client who doesn’t want to be be defended.  The Amish ways of justice are very different and Katie and Ellie have a rough go of it.  Katie can’t remember what happened and whenever she does, it’s just incriminating.  Ellie finds that preparing a court case on a dairy farm isn’t easy especially when she is without electricity, laptop or a phone.

Plain Truth is a love story, psychological drama, and courtroom suspense.  This being the fourth Jodi Picoult book that I’ve read in the last year further solidifies my thoughts that Picoult has found a formula that obviously works well for her.  I did feel as though everything that happened in Plain Truth has happened before.  We have the troubled teenager, crime, courtroom drama, medical mystery, woman lawyer, her love interest.  I felt any character could have easily been any character from another book.  I did pick up on the twist ending, as there was one sentence about two thirds of the way through the book where I realized “whodunit.”

As a mother, Plain Truth wasn’t fun to read.  We are talking about somebody who smothers a newborn.  But I was engrossed and kept turning the pages for more.  I was never at a loss for interest.  I enjoyed exploring the Amish culture and the questions that she raised about forgiveness, peace, and justice.  Everybody at my neighborhood book club did enjoy it a lot more than I did however.  I think if I hadn’t read any of her other books I would have enjoyed it more.  Does that make sense?

I still want to read My Sister’s Keeper, which I understand is a must read.  And it sits here staring at me from my bookshelf right now.   Other books I’ve reviewed are Nineteen Minutes, Change of Heart, and Tenth Circle.  Jodi Picoult’s next book Handle With Care will be released on March 3rd.  I hope to attend a book signing at Kings English Bookshop on March 25th to hear her give a reading.  Visit Jodi Picoult’s website to see if she’s on tour near you.

Copyright 2010. Maw Books Blog

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Knowing nothing about Jodi Picoult, I wasn’t quite sure what genre she even fell into. Then while browsing through my beloved Bookmarks Magazine I came across a review for Nineteen Minutes (which I didn’t read in full until after completing the book). They quoted the Christian Science Monitor as saying, “Nobody does ‘ripped from the headlines’ better than Picoult.” I’ve come to learn that Picoult takes tough issues head on.

Nineteen Minutes was a page turner. I could hardly put it down. While reading this book my dishes didn’t get done, the laundry didn’t get put away, dinner’s were simple, and the toys never got put away. A synopsis from Bookmarks Magazine:

On a cold March morning, 17-year-old Peter Houghton sets off for school with a small arsenal in his backpack. His lethal rampage takes only 19 minutes, but nine students and one teacher are killed, many are wounded, and the inhabitants of Sterling, New Hampshire, will never be the same. Moving back and forth through time, Jodi Picoult reveals the brutality and daily humiliation that Peter suffered at the hands of local bullies while following the drama of Peter’s trial. As the survivors and their families struggle to make sense of the tragedy, the parents wonder just how well they really know their children.

I can’t imagine reading about this if you’ve actually experienced a school shooting, but for those of us who pray that we never do, it seemed to portray what it would be like. Thank goodness I was never a target of bullying or a bully myself. I was quite happy and content in my little group of friends and was probably oblivious to this type of stuff in my high school. I won’t stereotype teenagers here, but I imagine that this kind of stuff does and will continue to happen. If only we could all have empathy and charity for those around us, the world would be a better place.

This was a brilliant inside look into bullying, it’s consequences, the heartache of a tragedy, it’s aftermath, and remembering that even a murderer has a mother who loves him.

The following video is a book trailer for Nineteen Minutes:

Visit Jodi Picoult’s website for a podcasts, group discussion guides, and more about the author.

So now that I have read my very first Jodi Picoult book, I will soon be reading Tenth Circle as part of an online book club. I also picked up My Sister’s Keeper secondhand and can’t wait to read both of these. What is your favorite Picoult book? If I were to choose only one book to read, which one should it be?