A Spark Of Light by Jodi Picoult

This is a rather surprising topic for a novel and one that is particularly charged in certain Countries.  Whether to be Pro-Choice or Pro-Life there is a miasma of belief in between the two states but this book deals, ultimately, with the extremes - the staunch Pro-Life protester who pickets at the Clinics and harasses the Health Care Providers and those who work in the clinics or need their services.  What I found exceptional about the book is that it does not come down on one side or the other.  Everybody referenced in the tale is a Human Being and treated as such, no matter what their belief.  That said though, there is more empathy from the author for those performing the procedures and undergoing them than there is for those telling them they are murderers.  What it did for me was allow me to see the protesters as people and to understand, a little, where they are coming from.

The hardest thing to get to grips with in this story is, strangely, not the subject matter.  It is the time hopping that goes on.  I understand working from the latter sections of the siege in the clinic and then working backwards.  However, the author has chosen to jump from events minutes before the shooter enters the clinic, to halfway through the siege and then back to weeks before.  It does make it difficult to build the timeline in your head properly and I did get turned around sometimes as to where in the timeline we actually where.

I liked the fact that the "products of conception" where not glossed over but the truth of the procedure was kept within the book - the medical truth that is devoid of emotion and religion.  I also learnt a lot about attitudes in America towards the decision of a woman to terminate her pregnancy; both from the woman making the decision, those who support her through and those who condemn her.  This does mean that I have taken my pre-conceived (pun NOT intended) notions in to this story and may have interpreted passages in a different way to those who bewlieve the polar opposite to me.

The biggest issue I had with the book is that we never find out what happens to Beth.  She is perhaps the biggest loser in the whole book and as the siege draws to an end she is the one that stands to lose not only her liberty but her family as well.  We presume that Bex survives, we presume that Dr Walsh survives, but we don't know.  We don;t know how Izzy's situation resolves - does she stick with Parker (to be fair he does seem to genuinely care and not give a toss about their societal differences) or does she destroy the one good thing in her life after her job?  Too many loose ends that I would have liked tieing up - maybe in the way they do at the end of films based on Real Life.

This is, in many ways, an ideal Book Club choice but be ready for arguments that will last long in to the night and will not all be to do with the book.  That said I read this in stave format through The Pigeonhole where you have the opportunity to discuss the story as you go along with other readers.  By the end of the first section I stepped away from this as I could see the potential for clashes.  I found it to be an emotive read that made me question my own prejudices, I also found myself caring about the disparate characters in the book and their particular reasons for being in that place at that time.

THIS IS AN HONEST AND UNBIASED REVIEW OF A COPY OF THIS BOOK RECEIVED VIA THE PIGEONHOLE.