Product Description

Cameron MacDonald has spent his life guided by duty. As the police chief of a small Massachusetts town that has been home to generations of his Scottish clan, he is bound to the town's residents by blood and honor. Yet when his cousin Jamie arrives at the police station with the body of his wife and the bald confession that he's killed her, Cam immediately places him under arrest.

The situation isn't as clear to Cam's wife, Allie. While she is devoted to her husband, she finds herself siding against Cam, seduced by the picture James paints of a man so in love with a woman that he'd grant all her wishes . . . even the one that meant taking her life.

Into this charged atmosphere drifts Mia, a new assistant at Allie's floral shop, for whom Cam feels an instant and inexplicable attraction. While he aids the prosecution in preparing the case against Jamie, who killed his terminally ill wife out of mercy, Cam finds himself betraying his own wife.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #5416 in Books
• Published on: 2008-03-20
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 464 pages

Review
'Jodi Picoult is not one to shy away from fictional controversy; in fact, the more tangled and messy a moral dilemma appears, the better she likes it. (Daily Mail )

'Picoult has been incredibly successful in dissecting the pain that family members go through when faced with sensitive and emotive issues' ( Daily Express )

'Picoult, once again, grabs a razor-sharp issue and uses her brilliantly intricate pen to expose all the shades of grey with PERFECTION.'

About the Author
Jodi Picoult grew up in Nesconset, New York. She received an A.B. in creative writing from Princeton and a master's degree in education from Harvard. Her previous novels include KEEPING FAITH, THE PACT, and MERCY. She lives in New Hampshire with her husband and three children.

Customer Reviews

Not the best I've read
I've read all of Jodi Picoults books and I am usually engrossed by the story. However this ione was a disappointment. It was a predictable story with not much excitement. If you are a fan do not read this as you will be left feeling hard done by.

completely real with a touch of magic
this is a novel i have really longed to read and i have not been disapointed. jodi picoult brings home the goods as always! a man ends the painful life of his wife who has a terminal illness because he loves her too much to see her in pain. He does it in a town where his cousin is the police chief and hopes for compassion although he still has to stand trial and face the prejudices of the New England towns folk.This story will make you cry because it touches onto things that have some relevances to everyones lives and yet in true Jodi Picoult style has an aspect of magic and a mini miracle which we all long to find. Totally absorbing, showing strength of human character and how deeply someone and love.

MEA CULPA
I can't remember reading a book where all the characters had such undesirable traits that reading any further became an effort. The only character who was somewhat bearable was a cat and that's probably because it spent its time either eating or hidden in someone's backpack serving as a parallel to everything else that's hidden away in this small town of Wheelock, MA.

I'm already a Jodi Picoult fan having read and liked four of her other books -- The Pact, Keeping Faith, Plain Truth and Salem Falls -- so when I say that I didn't enjoy this book at all, I have a good basis for comparison. Never before have I read a book where I felt so detached from each and every character. The wife Allie has no backbone, the husband Cam has no loyalty, the mistress Mia has no values, the mercy killer Jamie has no fortitude, his dead wife Maggie was selfish, Cam's mother Ellen is a wacko.....I could go on and on.

The backdrop of the story is one of intense love -- so intense that your emotions take over your senses. There's a case of a mercy killing, another story of a cheating spouse and a courtroom scene where all the scenarios are played out. The events leading up to and after the killing are all impulsive -- sometimes so impulsive that they're hard to believe. There are other parts in the book where reality is suspended and mysticism takes over. I'm always at a loss when an author resorts to this.

Probably the biggest complaint I have is the intense lack of editing. I can't stand when I'm reading a book and two people are having a conversation yet the name you're reading on the typewritten page is NOT the name of the person who is actually doing the talking. This happened on three separate occasions and after awhile, it only added to my overall confusion and lack of continuity of my reading experience. I'm usually not this hard when reviewing a book and it could be the fact that I read it in the midst of our great American tragedy which could have altered my mood considerably. For that reason, I've given it three stars as opposed to the two stars which I had originally intended. Somehow though, I don't think it was my mood...the book just wasn't that enjoyable for me.