Nineteen Minutes

by Jodi Picoult

http://www.jodipicoult.com/nineteen-minutes.html

"In this emotionally charged novel, Jodi Picoult delves beneath the surface of a small town to explore what it means to be different in our society.

In Sterling, New Hampshire, 17-year-old high school student Peter Houghton has endured years of verbal and physical abuse at the hands of classmates. His best friend, Josie Cormier, succumbed to peer pressure and now hangs out with the popular crowd that often instigates the harassment. One final incident of bullying sends Peter over the edge and leads him to commit an act of violence that forever changes the lives of Sterling’s residents.

Even those who were not inside the school that morning find their lives in an upheaval, including Alex Cormier. The superior court judge assigned to the Houghton case, Alex—whose daughter, Josie, witnessed the events that unfolded—must decide whether or not to step down. She’s torn between presiding over the biggest case of her career and knowing that doing so will cause an even wider chasm in her relationship with her emotionally fragile daughter. Josie, meanwhile, claims she can’t remember what happened in the last fatal minutes of Peter’s rampage. Or can she? And Peter’s parents, Lacy and Lewis Houghton, ceaselessly examine the past to see what they might have said or done to compel their son to such extremes. Rich with psychological and social insight, Nineteen Minutes is a riveting, poignant, and thought-provoking novel that has at its center a haunting question. Do we ever really know someone?"

I read the book the past 2 days when I was home on MC. Knowing Picoult's style, I knew starting a book meant not putting it down til I reach the last page, coz the conclusion to her stories are never what you expect it to be. Nineteen minutes made me think. About parenting, about individual uniqueness, about doing what is right, about factors that shape a person. I listened to the podcast, in which she talked about the story behind writing Nineteen Minutes, in it, she said, "uniqueness is meant to be celebration, not to be scorned"

Strangely, the phantom from Phantom of the Opera came to mind in the course of my reading.

Sometimes we are so quick to judge people for their actions. To call someone a murderer because he has killed people. To call someone a terrorist because he has struck a building. To call someone evil because he wants control over a woman. To call someone a thief because he steals.

But oftentimes, we forget the experiences that make a person. The circumstances he/she has been subjected to. The value system he/she has grown up in. The triggering point that made him/her commit that act that thrusts them into the catergory of "criminals".

Sure, all of us have choices. And sure, we believe that what differentiate a good person from a great person is the choices they make. The path they choose to take.

But what if you're pushed to the limit? Where one loses the capacity to consider if there are any other options? Where one loses the capacity to rationalise what is lawfully right and what isn't? If there seem to be nothing else for you to do but to steal that bread to feed your children? If there seem to be no one willing to help you, but to depend on yourself to stand up against injustice? If the world scorns you that you have to hide in isolation?

we like to think we understand people and the world we live in.

But can we ever?