Book Review: The Tenth Circle by Jodi Picoult

Last weekend, I read The Tenth Circle by Jodi Picoult. I’ve read Picoult’s other books, I think I liked them, they are similar to all others in that genre. I started reading the book on a Sunday morning and after sneaking pages in all day in between running after Jack, I was still reading it at 1:00am Monday morning. It was suspenseful and I was reading it like it was crack. I knew I would really regret this in the morning when I had to get up for work, but I couldn’t go to sleep without finishing it. While, despite skimming through a late story line at the end, I did. It was a bit of a “quick finish” where an author tries to tie up 30 loose strings in five pages, but it was done. I went to sleep satisfied.

The next day, I remembered my pledge to start contributing to those forums I visit a lot, like Amazon.com ratings or Allrecipes.com. Damn. Why did I have to pledge to be so consciousnesses? Anyway, feeling guilty, I did go and write a review, giving the book a good review based on how compelling I found it that I read it all in one day.

The next day, I woke up with a major “book hangover”. The more I thought about The Tenth Circle, the more I felt like I had been wearing beer goggles and hooked up with an ugly guy, who had temporarily appeared cute. In retrospect, I don’t think I actually know what the result of the main story line was. What kind of person writes a book where you get to the end and still don’t know what happened? Argh! And geez, that thing on the bridge towards the end, what was THAT about? How unrealistic can you get?!

So I think I have changed my mind. The Tenth Circle is like Chinese food- you’ll be hungry one the soy sauce high wears off. That said, I’m always impressed that anyone has the focus to sit down and write a book from beginning to end, so good for you Jodi. At least you wrote it so armchair critics like me could have something to complain about!