Review of Jodi Picoult's Nineteen Minutes
A Unique Look at a High School Shooting
New York Times bestseller Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult is a novel that will keep readers thinking and emotionally charged long after they finish the book. This novel is extremely well written and Picoult does an excellent job in character development and event description.
What is Nineteen Minutes About?
Nineteen Minutes is the story of a high school shooting. While parts of the book are about the victims and families of the shooting, the focus is mainly on the shooter and a girl who is his sometimes friend.
Picoult does not write from the perspective of a grieving parent or an outraged community member. Instead she explores the life of the shooter, his struggles, and years worth of events that led up to him gunning down his classmates.
Who is the Victim?
While it is clear that the dead and wounded are the victims of any shooting, Picout paints a picture that leads readers to wonder if the teenage shooter himself might also be a victim. The shooter named Peter was bullied from the day he started kindergarten and every day of his life consisted of physical and verbal abuse from his classmates. He was humiliated in the worst ways. His days consisted of being picked on and an in essence tortured at all times. No one stood up for him and no one tried to stop the bullying, not even teachers. After years of this Peter snapped. This book does not justify the actions of the shooter but it does help readers to see why he did what he did.
Exploring Children's Access to Guns
Peter knew how to shoot a gun long before he took one to school. His father was a hunter and taught Peter to shoot at a young age. Peter's father struggles with guilt because of this after the shootings. The question of whether Peter would have taken the actions he did if he did not have such easy access to guns and did not know how to shoot them.
Exploring Unmonitored Computer Use
Before the shooting took place Peter created a video game depicting someone who could be considered a geek gunning down and earning points for killing popular students. The setting for this game was a high school. Peter's parent's had no knowlege of this game. Peter had a computer in his room and his activities were not monitored. Reader's are left wondering if the shooting might have been avoided if his parents knew about the game and talked to him about why he created it.
Twists, Turns, and Unexpected Events
In this novel Picoult keeps readers attention by revealing secrets and providing shocking plot twists that are extremely unexpected. Parent child relationships are explored mainly between Peter and his parents and a girl named Alex and her mother. As the novel progresses secrets the children carry are revealed to th reader of which the teens' parents are blissfully unaware. The question of whether a parent can really know their own child is brought to mind. The novel ends with a revelation that no one sees coming.
What Makes Up a Life
The underlying question throughout this novel is whether or not one event should be used to judge a person and his life. Yes, in nineteen minutes Peter shot many classmates. This was a horrible act and one that he had to be punished for. Does this act negate all other aspects of Peter?
Works Cited
Jodi Picoult. Nineteen Minutes. New York: Washington Squares Press, 2008.
ISBN: 978-0-7434-9673-5
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