Jodi Picoult hits the top of the list
Today’s best-seller list has Jodi Picoult’s newest book The Book of Two Ways at #1. People must like this author, right? Well, not everyone. Picoult doesn’t write feel-good books. She probably will not win a Pulitzer prize for literature. Her books, however, make the reader think because she often presents complicated family situations and deep ethical issues. The Sandcastle Book Club read Small Great Things recently and appreciated the racial themes and courtroom drama. This new #1 book goes back to Picoult’s typical focus–moral ambiguity.
While I haven’t read The Book of Two Ways, I want to. And soon. First of all, the book focuses on Egyptology, a subject I have long found fascinating. While browsing National Geographic magazines as a child, I became a devotee to all things ancient, with Egypt being at the top of the list. Secondly, Picoult takes a look at a theme Robert Frost mused about–the road less taken. What if……. Of course, rehashing the past and what could have been is a totally useless exercise but one that is hypnotic, none the less.
Karin Tanabe, a book reviewer for the Washington Post, warns that Picoult does not take a linear path in the novel. Some readers could find her method confusing. Other readers will find the theme of ‘love lost and then found’ very familiar. And, in some ways, it sounds as if the book may remind one of Kate Atkinson’s Life After Life. Even though Jodi Picoult is a commercial writer, I agree with Stephen King’s assessment of Picoult as being a popular fiction writer who can actually write. If you haven’t tried a Jodi Picoult book, you might try this one. If you have read this author, you will (or will not) want to read The Book of Two Ways.
I may have to strike Jodi Picoult from my list of authors. I recently read Vanishing Acts and was deeply disappointed. At first blush, she seemed to have selected an intriguing controversial topic – a case of a child stolen by her real father and given a new identity. However, the book quickly devolved into numerous, unrelated side issues (native American Mysticism, alcoholism, etc. to the point of silliness. I had to force myself to finish it but it was very unsatisfying.