Jodi Picoult writes about difficult themes with the grace of a prima ballerina. In The Storyteller she takes on holocaust survivors, German SS guards and how generations are affected.
Picoult knows how to keep readers turning the pages and how to write unforgettable stories. Characters’ lives are intertwined in The Storyteller as Picoult deliciously reveals details.
Sage is a baker with a secret that haunts her and taunts her with her facial disfigurement. Josef may, or may not, be who he appears to be. Is Leo a knight in shining armor, or is he a troublemaker? Will Sage learn her grandmother’s story? All questions are answered by story’s end, of course, as well as they mystery of Ania and Aleks.
Here are a couple of tantalizing excerpts.
“Making bread is an athletic event. Not only does it require dashing around to several stations of the bakery as you check rising loaves or mix ingredients or haul the mixing bowl out of the cradle—but it also takes muscle power to activate the gluten in the dough . . . the point where you have to leave the dough alone. It’s silly to anthropomorphize bread, but I love the fact that it needs to sit quietly, to retreat from touch, and noise and drama, in order to evolve.”
When using first person point of view, here’s a way to show what your character looks like without looking in the mirror. Picoult writes, “. . . Josef asks me questions. Was my mother a redhead like me?”
More Picoult gorgeous writing. “. . . I want to find information on Sage Singer. . . her voice.
It’s smoky. It sounds like the first night in autumn when you build a fire in the fireplace and drink a glass of port and fall asleep with a dog on your lap. Not that I have a dog or port, but you get what I mean.”
The Storyteller is a story of imagination, getting to the truth and the amazing will to live.
