LONE WOLF BY JODI PICOULT
Jodi Picoult, a prolific writer in her own right, brings her readers’ attention to a number of vital and difficult questions in her latest novel Lone Wolf in which we are forced to question our morals. A father’s life falls into the hands of his two children as he lays in a coma; his daughter Cara believes defiantly in the fighting spirit, the spirit of the wolf. His estranged son, Edward who has difficulty accepting his father’s choice of living and running with wolves over his family, decides he should be allowed to die and have his organs donated. We are forced to ask these questions; who has the right to die? And can that decision be made for another person?
Luke Baxter’s fascination with wolves stem from the myth that surrounds them and misrepresentations about them, his sense of ‘not belonging’ forces him to make a choice between these beautiful creatures and his family, he chooses the prior. In the wild, he sheds his human skin with abandon and joins his wolf family, and in doing so, he attempts to leave behind all that makes him human, yet it is one particular human emotion that forces him to realise he must return home, and to the shock of the reader, it is not his need to be with his own family. When he returns to his family, and life amongst the human variety, it is undoubtedly clear that something has been left behind and the Luke Baxter before us is a mere shadow, but can a person’s shadow exist if there was never really a person there before you?
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I just love Jodi Picoult and I found "Lone Wolf" incredibly creative and poignant. She covers many subjects with this one book well.