Page Turners – July/August review

In July the Page Turners read ‘Lone Wolf‘ which was published in 2012 and is the twentieth book by bestselling author Jodi Picoult. However due to most of us being away, we cancelled the July meeting and postponed the discussion until August.

In the book Luke is in a coma and his two children are battling to be nominated as the one who can legally make the decision about whether to turn off his life support system. They have both had very different experiences of their father during their teenage years and as a result have differing views as to what would be the right decision.

Prior to the accident that left him in a coma, Luke had worked with wolves and had even spent time living in the wild with a wolf pack. This had a Jodi Picoult profound effect on him and on his family. Interspersed with the main story we are told of that time in flashback. We learn a great deal (perhaps too much!) about the behaviour of wolf packs and the different roles of wolves within the pack.

In many ways this seemed like two different books melded together. At least one of us was tempted to read all the ‘family’ story first and then go back and learn about wolves afterwards. However, others felt that there were interesting parallels to be drawn between the behaviour of the wolves and the way the different family members responded to the events that befell them. Some of us found that the time Luke spent living in the wild was implausible and others found parts of it distasteful. It did appear to be very well researched, however I have read online that the author has been strongly criticised by some wolf experts because her information is inaccurate and misleading.

We liked the way the narrative is told from the points of view of different characters. This helps to understand the different points of view of the two young people and the reasoning behind their decisions. We felt all the characters were well-rounded and relatable.

I think we mostly enjoyed reading this book and we certainly enjoyed discussing it. It was thought provoking because it made us wonder what would be our decision if a family member was in Luke’s position and what we would want for ourselves.

We were kept guessing right to the end as to who would get to make the decision about Luke’s life support but I think we were happy with the way it went.

Although some of us have read a number of books by this author, she was new to others and they will have much to look forward to as they explore her other work. If you would like to read this particular book for yourself, do get in touch and perhaps we can swap our page turner for one of your own.

Deborah Wallis, Convenor