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The Pact: A Love Story
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The Pact: A Love Story
Unavailable
The Pact: A Love Story
Ebook598 pages9 hours

The Pact: A Love Story

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

4/5

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Currently unavailable

About this ebook

“Engrossing...The Pact is compelling reading.”—People

In this heart-rending tale of love and friendship, Jodi Picoult brings to life a familiar world, and in a single terrifying moment awakens every parent’s worst fear: We think we know our children . . . but do we ever really know them at all?

The Golds and the Hartes, neighbors for eighteen years, have always been inseparable. So have their children—and it’s no surprise that in high school Chris and Emily’s friendship blossoms into something more. But the bonds of family, friendship, and passion—which had seemed so indestructible—suddenly threaten to unravel in the wake of unimaginable tragedy.

When midnight calls from the hospital come in, no one is ready for the truth. Emily is dead at seventeen from a gunshot wound to the head. There’s a single unspent bullet in the gun that Chris pilfered from his father’s cabinet—a bullet that Chris tells police he intended for himself. But a local detective has doubts about the suicide pact that Chris describes.

This extraordinary, poignant novel paints an indelible portrait of two families in anguish . . . and creates an astonishingly suspenseful courtroom drama as Chris is put on trial for murder.


Editor's Note

A sensational debut…

Suspenseful and tragic, Picoult’s breakout love story comes to a stunning crescendo amidst impossible circumstances.

LanguageEnglish
PublisherHarperCollins
Release dateOct 6, 2009
ISBN9780061980244
Unavailable
The Pact: A Love Story
Author

Jodi Picoult

JODI PICOULT is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of twenty-six novels. She is the recipient of numerous awards, including the New England Bookseller Award for Fiction, the ALA’s Alex Award, the New Hampshire Literary Award for Outstanding Literary Merit, and the prestigious Sarah Josepha Hale Award in recognition of her distinguished body of written work. She lives in New Hampshire with her husband. They have three children. You can visit her website at wwww.jodipicoult.com  

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Reviews for The Pact

Rating: 3.874247180582992 out of 5 stars
4/5

4,151 ratings126 reviews

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  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Near perfect "chick lit"
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Captivating. Humorous. I have read this more than once.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    I liked that, as in most of her other novels, the ending is unpredictable. I do feel, however, that she is beginning to recycle some of her characters, such as the attorney and his investigator sidekick.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    This was an interesting summer/beach read. As an attorney, I enjoyed the trial and closing arguments.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    I just don't feel the plot was that strong. I almost wanted to stop reading. I love Jodi Picoult but this wasn't her best piece of literature.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    compelling, captivating, well-resesrched. a gut punch to read for any parent, another outstanding novel by Jodi Picoult, one of my favorite authors.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    must always have a happy ending and life is not like that.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Part One of this book was tedious and I really struggled with it, Part Two was better and Part Three (the court case) was great. At times I found this book depressing as it made you realise that, as a parent, no matter how well you think you know your own children, you really don't. A sad story but not one of Picoult's better novels.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I found myself crying in parts of this book. As a person who has seen first hand what sucide does to a family I was so touched by this book and everyones prospectives. Jodi Picoult is an AMAZING author and I can't seem to get enough of her books.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    The Dallas Morning News says Jodi “Picoult has carved her own niche with her novels – one part romance, one part courtroom thriller, two parts social commentary,” and The Pact certainly fits. There are many similarities between this book and the other two of Picoult's that I've read, My Sister's Keeper and especially Nineteen Minutes. In the latter, the two main teenage characters (Peter and Josie) have also been friends nearly from birth like Chris and Emily, as have their mothers (Lacey and Alex respectively), and the mothers' friendship is negatively affected as is Gus' and Melanie's. Peter, like Chris, is also accused of murder. Jordan McAfee is the defense lawyer in both. And, in both, the book jumps back and forth between present and past.The “pact” refers to the supposed botched suicide pact that is Chris’ defense when he is charged with murdering Emily. Trouble is, Chris really did shoot the depressed and (unknown to him) pregnant Emily, at her request. The reader learns this early on. The book is really more about the characters: the progression (through flashback) of Chris and Emily’s relationship from childhood friendship to sex, the dissolution of the parents’ friendships after Emily’s death, and Chris’ growing awareness of himself and that Emily was not all that he thought she was.The weakest character is Emily. Her molestation in a men’s restroom at age nine is downplayed, both by Picoult and by Emily herself, but it’s never very clear why this teenager wanted to kill herself and take her supposed best friend with her. As one gets to know her mother, Melanie, one can see why Emily, her only child, did not confide in her. I really disliked Melanie. Probably what cemented it for me was the way she purposely misdirected the patrons at her library (pages 75-76) - being a librarian, that REALLY offended me.This book did generate some good discussion in an online group, about whether or not one can be too close to a non-relative, parental and societal expectations of relationships, and the making and breaking of friendships.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    It's been a while since I read this but I still remember it. Very riveting story and characters.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    A story of two sets of families, neighbors, whose children are so close they are like siblings. As they mature they become lovers, but the girl doesn't feel right about it. She becomes pregnant and wants to kill herself. She has Chris help her. She dies and he's accused of murder.
    Some of the errors in the book bothered me, but over all it was a good book.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    The first Jodi Picoult book that i have read. Loved it.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    A beautifully written but very sad love story. Friends since birth, two teenagers destined to marry bonded together in a suicide pact that changes the lives of family and friends forever. The questions raised in my mind during and after reading the book are still plaguing me. Wow! The book could have been a superb read had the author given more insight into Emily's secret, among other things. The loose ends is what kept me from giving it a 5 star rating. It is, however, a very good read that I would highly recommend.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    Too many unbelievable events to make it better than 3 stars, yet the writer's skills made it an engrossing, highly readable novel, which, if one is willing to suspend common sense and logic with the content and its presentation, this can be highly entertaining. I would consider reading another work from this author in the hopes that it might contain the excellent prose without the constant thinking "This couldn't happen" inherent in The Pact
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    There are certain sorts of books I tend to read late at night, before bed. They are usually mindless, "intellectual" love stories, suspense, thrillers, or mysteries. And so I found myself at the bookstore with an urge for such a book, and came across The Pact. And for the genre, it was a bit above average, though nothing that's inspiring me to read any more Picoult.
  • Rating: 3 out of 5 stars
    3/5
    While this was a pretty fast read, for its length there could have been more character development. I never felt like I really knew any of them and found I didn't really care what happened to them in the end.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Jodi Picoult's "The Pact" is billed as a love story but it is far more than that. It is a story of complex human relationships culminating in a John Grisham like Courtroom Drama. The story involves the death of Emily Gold. Is it a suicide or did Chris Harte kill her? That in essence is the plot but in answering this question Picoult has explored so many areas of relationships that the book tugged at my heartstrings. As for the trial each time a witness was examined and cross-examined I swayed between thinking Chris would be acquitted or convicted. No, I will not be a spoiler. This book is a must read.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    5 Stars, I know what your thinking: She must not read that much because I can tell 5 stars are very valued on this website. I absolutely loved this book. This was one of those books that I physically could not put down, I finished it in 2 days which for me was a pretty big deal because I do not on any terms consider myself an avid reader. This as any Jodi picot book involves a lawsuit, which is sometimes hard to relate to. This time it involved juniors in high school which was definitely a reason it appealed to me, a high school junior. Also I loved the characters, Chris mainly. In addition the ambiguity about the night in question is a theme throughout the book that is so alluring for some reason. You just want, nay need to keep on reading to see what actually happened and hope to god that Chris, my favorite, is not to be incriminated for it. Also the ending just makes you want to be a part of this tragic love story.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    This book may be just what you’re looking for if you’d like to immerse yourself for a while in the family problems of people you don’t necessarily like in the first place. Picoult is very adept at this. I don’t know why I keep doing it to myself, really — Anita Shreve does the same — except I’m pretty sure there’s going to be a reveal at the end of this one, and I have to find out what it is, even though my second-hand dog-ear-bookmarked version shows the original owner only got to about 100 pages before abandoning it. (I like to use other people’s dog ears as personal challenges. Spices life up a bit.)The Pact was published some time ago now and either it’s dated a bit or I’ve become a bit more attuned to the world and its problems. Specifically, here are some uncomfortably… conservative?… ideas which come up in the book but remain unchallenged by the story itself:1. That if a man loves a woman, really loves her, then he wouldn’t kill her.2. That if a woman has had sex with a man before, then it’s not going to be rape if he has sex with her again (which is indeed still true in the opinions of many jurors, granted)3. That in order to commit suicide you must be depressed. (Not true — some suicides are actually impulsive and come down to life circumstance.)4. That thinking you’ve moved in next door to a gay couple is reason enough to wonder ‘What sort of neighbourhood have we moved into?’This, and the nature of the story, mean that it’s not really escapist for anyone who already knows bad things are happening (especially to women) in the real world, but Picoult knows how to spin a good yarn. Except by about page 300 I was beginning to lose interest. I’m no fan of courtroom drama, as it happens. So by the end of the book I had no real interest in the verdict. I do feel this book should have been more condensed. I wasn’t interested in the private life of the lawyer, so would have preferred that subplot to have been omitted. Then again, someone had to deliver the speech at the end, the one explaining the book’s theme about truth, and so I suppose it was felt that the reader would want to know a little something about the person delivering it.
  • Rating: 2 out of 5 stars
    2/5
    This book was 200 pages too long, contained poorly written sex scenes, flimsy subplots and a really unsatisfying Epilogue. I don't even think anything passed the verdict announcement was necessary.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    If you have or have ever had teenage children, you've got to read this book. It is so true that as older adults we tend to forget, perhaps intentionally teenage angst, the emotional turmoil accompanied with those years. Done so well, Picoult captures that time of life, of everyone's life, so well in this classic story of teenage love and loss.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    I couldn't put it down. I wanted more, more, more!

    "The Pact" has something to do between seventeen-year-old Emily Gold and seventeen-year-old Chris Harte. The pair had been best friends their entire lives and later end up as lovers. Picoult takes us through the “now” and “then” to help us understand the story and the characters.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Heartbreaking.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    Picoult at her best.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    Enjoyed & am finally donating as I need to cull bookshelves before moving.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    What a painful and difficult book to read. The boy and girl next door - sharing from bassinette to mud baths to intimacy to death - how this shattering ending to the families' most cherished fairy tale wounds them all.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    "Do you know... what it's like to love someone so much, that you can't see yourself without picturing [them]? Or what it's like to touch someone, and feel like you've come home?""...and he suddenly knew that if she killed herself, he would die. Maybe not immediately, maybe not with the same blinding rush of pain, but it would happen. You couldn't live for very long without a heart." A wonderful book about expectations and the fear of not accomplishing your goals and letting your loved ones down. It was a rocky road from before the trial and during trying to get a sense of how Chris truly felt and what really occurred. I thought the pace was pretty good through out and I liked the ending.
  • Rating: 5 out of 5 stars
    5/5
    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 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.
  • Rating: 4 out of 5 stars
    4/5
    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 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.