#1 New York Times bestselling author Jodi Picoult is a born storyteller who “writes with a fine touch, a sharp eye for detail, and a firm grasp of the delicacy and complexity of human relationships” (The Boston Globe). Small Great Things is Picoult at her finest–complete with unflinching insights, richly layered characters, and a page-turning plot with a gripping moral dilemma at its heart.
… dilemma at its heart.
Ruth Jefferson, a labor and delivery nurse, begins a routine checkup on a newborn, only to be told a few minutes later that she’s been reassigned to another patient. The parents are white supremacists and don’t want Ruth, who is African American, to touch their child. The hospital complies, but the next day, the baby goes into cardiac distress while Ruth is alone on the ward. Does she obey orders or does she intervene?
Ruth hesitates before performing CPR and, as a result, is charged with a serious crime. Kennedy McQuarrie, a white public defender, takes her case, but Kennedy insists that mentioning race in the courtroom is not a winning strategy. Conflicted by Kennedy’s counsel, Ruth tries to keep life as normal as possible–especially for her teenaged son. And as the trial moves forward, Ruth and Kennedy come to see that what they’ve been taught their whole lives about others–and themselves–might be wrong.
From the Hardcover edition.
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This should be required reading for everyone. I loved this book!!!
I have been reading this author’s books for many years and this is the most thought provoking book ever. My favorite by far.
This was a well written story. Characters felt real. It made me think about the world as a place bigger than my personal experience. And as a nurse, I related to some points specifically.
A very powerful book. Everyone should read it. We had a great discussion at our Book Club.
I didn’t like this book. It had a “surprise twist” near the end that was cheap. I didn’t believe the characters or the plot.
This book really hits home with its frank and outspoken views of race relations in our country today. Picoult challenges her readers to examine their own views in light of the circumstances of the main character. I applaud her efforts – the story was compelling and powerful, and so very human! It could possibly have reached further in its attempts to examine and explain white privilege, but hopefully some will be enlightened. I highly recommend it.
interesting and thought-provoking read.
Uncomfortable at times but helpful to read
Really enjoyed this story about our legal system and racial overtones in our society. Characters were very understandable and easy to relate to.
According to the book’s cover (visible on my Kindle), the Washington Post review indicated that it is the most important book Jodi Picoult, a prolific and accomplished novelist, has ever written. Although I’ve read, appreciated and enjoyed many of this author’s other books, I have to agree with that statement.
The timeliness and significance of the story are evident. Consider current public discourse among you and your friends and the currents, crosscurrents and undercurrents of events as headlined and chronicled in all sorts of media outlets.
There are three main character groups in the novel. The primary protagonist is a black woman of color, Ruth, who is an experienced, very competent and compassionate obstetrical nurse accused of the murder of a newborn baby. Other main members of her group are her son, Edison, and her sister, Adisa.
A second, directly oppositional group is mainly composed of the deceased newborn, Davis, the young birth parents, Brit and Turk, and Brit’s father, Francis. They are of the congregate of believers that white people are an endangered part of the U.S. population.
A third group is comprised of Kennedy and her family. Although white and coming from a background of relative privilege, Kennedy has chosen to act as a public defender. She is financially able to do so because her husband, Micah, is a successful attorney willing to support her aspirations and be the primary support of their family. Kennedy chooses to take on the defense of Ruth’s murder case despite her relative inexperience in handling such high-profile cases because she feels drawn to do so for many reasons shown in the story and for some reasons initially unknown even to herself.
Picoult has developed contrasting and interwoven characters here who all invite compassionate attempts on the part of readers to understand them and why they think and do what they do in the story.
I think that for me the operative word, “all,” in the paragraph above is the crux of the story. I say that because in the past I continually questioned how anyone could automatically dismiss another person as “less than” or inconsequential or not deserving of equal rights because of skin color or a differing belief system.
It has been, and continues to be, especially difficult for me to understand people I have heretofore seen as not deserving of my understanding because of violent thoughts and acts perpetrated on others. A term useful to me right now to identify this group is “white supremacist.” I cannot ever excuse violence done to others either because of a belief that they are not as deserving of consideration and understanding as I am or just because I need to relieve tension by acting out harmfully in anger. But I realize that those who do perpetrate such acts deserve my attempts to understand them as human beings and why they think what they think and do as they do.
Otherwise, there is no chance of ameliorating such situations and beliefs that do harm to all in the long run.
Thus what Picoult has done for me in “Small Great Things” is to humanize all of the characters she writes about, giving me a chance to increase my own understanding of human nature in all its facets. I can hope to look someone in the eye and see their humanity, giving me an increased opportunity to be able to communicate with them and listen to them. This kind of understanding, I believe, if propagated, can–if one can hope–lead to a general healing of divisions among people of all sorts of colors, beliefs and ways of being.
It made me think.
One of the top five books I’ve read!
The social and political references in this book are highly relevant for today’s America.
This is one of the best books I’ve ever read. I recommend it to everyone. It made me look at racism in a whole new way. It’s one I will keep and re- read,
Good character development.
This should be required reading for everyone who needs to gain insight on racial issues.
This as a well written story that was difficult to put down.
Stayed up late reading this book. Really enjoyed it
I like how she tells the story from each person’s point of view.
I am just two thirds into it and I pick it back up every chance I have even ten minutes. Very hard to bear the skinhead parts but a gripping pathos filled story.