The Pact

Interesting the way the author deals with the questions of what love is and how we show it. Mainly, though, I thought this story pointedly showed the dangers of parents who abdicate parenting once their children enter adolescence. Compounding the trauma of sexual abuse was a tacit encouragement of sexual activity by her parents when their daughter was obviously not equipped to deal with all the emotional fall-out of such an intense relationship. Instead of protecting their daughter and allowing her to be a child, they pushed her to be an adult. A lot to think about.

The story opens with a young couple, a shot, and a tragedy. So much is predicted from the blurb.

Chris and Emily grew up almost as brother and sister. Their parents assume that eventually they’ll fall in love and get married. We learn this because the book is cleverly written, with dated chapters detailing ‘now’ - the story, as it happens, after the shooting incident - and ‘then’, going back eighteen years or more, and then gradually moving forward so that we learn about these young people and their intense relationship.

The first third of the book is mostly about Chris, the second third about Emily, and the final third is set in a courtroom where, gradually, the truth unfolds.

It’s a draining book. It’s also a moving show more exploration of the relationship between parents and teens. It raises questions about parental expectations; of whether it’s healthy for close friends to fall in love; of how even in what seems to be a clear-cut case, there’s a often room for doubt.

I can’t say I ‘enjoyed’ the book, exactly; but it’s powerful, thought-provoking in many respects, brilliantly written, and I'm glad I read it. The story will stay with me for a while, as will some of the issues raised. So I can't give it less than five stars: I recommend it to anyone dealing with teenagers in any way, but approach with caution. It's traumatic in places, and extremely difficult to put down once started. show less

This is the second time I’ve actually read this book, and my second Jodi Picoult novel. I bought and read this book at a tumultuous time in Malta, when a young couple where found at the foot of a cliff towards the North of the island, one of them dead, one of them alive. The one who was alive claimed that it was a suicide pact, and that he too was meant to die. The girl was pronounced dead, and had died on impact with the rocks. This case is old now, and remains unsolved. But I remember reading this book for the first time around the time that this case was still being investigated, and everything was so eerily similar, it was almost like I was living through the trial myself just by being in a country where something similar had just show more happened.

The novel follows two families, the Harts and the Golds. Emily Gold and Chris Hart are teenagers in love, who have spent their whole life knowing each other. Their parents are best friends (or rather, their mothers are, and their fathers have been dragged into the friendship by proxy). Emily and Chris have been, from the beginning, dealing with their parents’ expectations: they want them to get married in the future, because they reason that it’s the best future for the both of them.

One night, though, Emily is found dead – a bullet to the head – and Chris is found unconscious, and holding the gun that shot her. He claims it was a suicide pact, but nobody else can corroborate all this, and the situation looks even more dire when the evidence starts rolling in – Emily never displayed suicidal tendencies, she had a whole life to live for, there were signs of a struggle that night, and she was pregnant with Chris’s baby.

The novel explores the intricacies of the legal system when the victim of the crime isn’t present to testify, and the perpetrator claims that there wasn’t a crime to begin with. Picoult does a wonderful job of introducing us to both Chris and Emily’s point of view of the story, centering more around Chris’s towards the end as he is the one to relate it to us, the audience. We find out why Emily wanted to kill herself in the first place, as well as the amazing amount of pressure that they were both under, that played a huge part in their suicide pact. We see the effects of teenage love on two very impressionable young people who cared about each other more than anything. And we see a friendship between adults fall apart in a way that can never be repaired.

While not coming from a legal background, Picoult does an incredible amount of research that clearly shows in her writing. This woman does not write unprepared, and you have to appreciate the tremendous amount of effort that she puts into conveying the story through the most accurate way possible. She shows an understanding of the legal system and of her characters that I rarely find in other novels that deal with such a vast cast.

The novel also does a very good job of asking very important questions, among them one that I find myself asking every time I read this book: Isn’t it weird that Emily and Chris’s parents wanted them to be together so badly? Couldn’t they see how damaging that could be to their children in the long run?

Really, I would recommend this novel to anybody who wants an engaging story with well-developed characters. While the ending might not be to everyone’s liking, the element of realism that Picoult manages to convey in her writing style, in the way her characters interact, in the way that they feel so real and they way they think, is surely more than enough to engage anybody.

Final rating: 5/5 show less

This is a review I wrote in 2007:

**`Do you know what it's like to love someone so much, that you can't see yourself without picturing her?**

`Do you know what it's like to love someone so much, that you can't see yourself without picturing her? Or what it's like to touch someone, and feel like you've come home?' (Chris)

Chris and Emily knew each other their whole lives. They grew up living next door to each other, were soul mates, best friends, inseparable... like twins. As teenagers their love for each other developed into something more and they became girlfriend & boyfriend - exactly what their parents had hoped would happen. They are bright, still at school, with promising futures ahead of them. But then Em is found dead, shot with a show more single bullet, and Chris with her - injured but very much alive. So what really happened that night? Could Chris have pulled the trigger? Or was this an awful suicide pact gone very wrong?

If you've forgotten what it was like to be seventeen years old, then read this, and remember. Full of passion, emotion and tortuous decisions - another brilliant novel from Jodi Picoult. show less

Emily and Chris have known each other forever. Their parents are neighbours and their mothers were pregnant at the same time. They were always inseparable and did end up falling in love as teenagers. But when their suicide pact goes wrong, Chris is still alive, and suspected of murder...

Like with Picoult's other books, this story is told both in flashbacks and with different viewpoints, so the reader gets some insight into each character. Because of all the different viewpoints, the reader can also see how each character is affected by what is happening and what has happened. The book builds until the end, during the trial when what really happened comes to light. It's another page-turner where I wanted to know what really happened. As show more much as I liked it, I'm not sure this one affected me as much as some of her other books. That being said, it was still very good and I did want to keep reading. show less

I had an interesting experience reading "The Pact" - I couldn't put it down, yet I almost couldn't bear to feel the pain of the characters as the plot continuously unwound. The story is brilliantly written, bouncing from perspective to perspective, giving us a unique view of the picture as a whole while leaving out key fragments until we, the readers, were ready to read them. Picoult's writing is poignant and touching, putting things in such a way that I couldn't help but feel sympathy for every character in the book in some way. It is an intense journey that will leave you guessing at what the truth actually is until the very end.

This is a tale of obsession, loss, tragedy, and all the seemingly numerous varieties of guilt. It begins with a failed suicide pact between two teenagers. Emily Gold dies, but the precise reasons behind her death remain obscure. Who pulled the trigger? Her boyfriend, Chris Harte, survives because of having fainted before he could also take his own life, either can't or is unwilling to offer any explanation. The story now shifts back and forth across time and traces the growth of the long, and complex relationship between Emily and Chris. The two families first settled down next to each other...they seemed to be the perfect neighbors and friends. Both families are upper-class New Englanders; both the husbands are doctors; both the wives show more are pregnant at that time so in a sense the pairing of Chris and Emily happened even before they were born. They slept in the same bassinet, they go on to develop a secret language just for the two of them, they are always together...everywhere. As adolescents they are drawn into a fevered romance. It seems inconceivable that Chris could have killed Emily, but a preponderance of forensic evidence suggests that that just might be the case. On his 18th birthday, Chris is arrested. Of course, the perfect harmony between the families instantly dissolves. Melanie Gold, unable to accept the notion that her perfect daughter could have been suicidal and focuses all her anger on the "murderer" next door. Instead of standing by Chris, his father, James, disinherits his son who he now considers a liability to his prestigious career. Chris himself, gets saddled with a hot-shot lawyer who is much more interested in building a case than in hearing or finding the truth. Chris sinks into despair. The trial alternates between rapid-fire testimony with flashbacks to the actual suicide. These are particularly powerful, and what Chris finally says when he takes the stand comes as a BIG surprise. Overall...it's a moving story, mixed with elements of mystery and a sensitive exploration of a tragic subject. show less