Picture Perfect

I didn't enjoy this one as much as the other Picoult books that I have read..not sure why. Maybe there wasn't the same level of controversy and a clear differentiation of the points of view. I have always enjoyed the “many voices” around the issues.

I have read all of Jodi Picoult's novels this far and they have been a bit of a mixed bag - some are outstanding like Ninteen Minutes where as others are less than perfect like Picture Perfect was.

The sleeve sounded really promising - anthropologist Carrie wakes up in a graveyard with no memory of who she is and how she got there, she subsequently finds out she is married to Hollywood movie star Alex Rivers and goes home with her husband to a life of apparent love and luxury. However there is a darker side to her husband which becomes apparent through the flashbacks she begins to experience and the behaviours she witnesses from her husband as they spend more time together.

The only issue I had was that the fundamental storyline was great, a story of domestic abuse and a womans need to escape for the sake of her unborn child - and to be fair the bits of the book that focused on this were really good, it was all the stuff inbetween that I found unnecessary - the indian reservation and native indian connection - I literally was skipping pages of the book to get past them. The way it kept going back to look at childhood experiences of both Carrie and Alex - whilst these were relevant they just were placed at points of the story where I wanted to be focusing on the present and I found it an intrustion into the book to keep taking me back in time.

As I said Picoult does seem to suffer from the curse of either producing really good or really mediocre books, I'd keep reading her novels as you never know whether the next one is going to be truly one of her great reads.

No court room drama here, just good writing. Although the typical Jodi amnesia storyline is still there, I liked this book and love that Jodi writes about real life issues.