BOOK REVIEW

Trapped In The Whirlpool Of What Might Have Been

Book review of Second Glance by Jodi Picoult

CD cover for audio book of Second Glance by Jodi Picoult. Credit Atria and Simon and Schuster

Can lovers find each other through the mysteries of death, murder, space and time? Can a ghostly haunting help solve a murder investigation? Can a near-death experience save the living from their own self-destruction?

I just finished the book “Second Glance” by Jodi Picoult and loved this story of enduring love and forgiveness. This story has a riveting plot of ghosts and hauntings and the history of a town, Comtosook, which can’t be put to rest. The characters, the ghost hunting story and the pure authenticity of dialogue are beautiful in this well-constructed story of life, regret and loss.

If you’ve never read Picoult books, she writes stories written from diverse characters perspectives of life’s difficult questions. “Second Glance” artfully melds prejudices we face with intertwining characters.

Three families’ pasts and present collide on a well-plotted integration of life’s questions on what it means to be fully alive. The story also explores the warped chapter of science and history of eugenics in Vermont. Eugenics was a pseudoscience encouraging sterilization, among other things, of people and races considered to be “less perfect” than others.