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Book Review of Handle with Care

Handle with Care
Handle with Care
Author: Jodi Picoult
Genre: Literature & Fiction
Book Type: Paperback
nnaylime avatar reviewed on + 14 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 1


Unsettling and profound, Picout has a gift of writing people that come to life with direct simplicity. This book was thought-provoking. It was directly written, but not an easy read because it raised a lot of difficult, ethical questions--and uncomfortable emotions, and for that reason was also a good read.

That said, I do have one quibble and two caveats.

The quibble is that I found the sections written in the voice of the daughter--Amelia to be a bit too self-aware, orderly, and in some cases "nicely" written to be convincing as a teenager. There were several turns of phrase that jumped out to me as "too elegant" or polished to be truly that of a young woman in her early teens. For the same reason her knowledge of her own disease and emotions associated with it while deeply moving also struck me as a little to self-aware for someone suffering from it.

The caveats are as follows: I would STRONGLY caution mothers of disabled children and those with any history of self-injury against reading it as it has the potential to be VERY triggery.