My Sister's Keeper: A Novel

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Simon and Schuster, Apr 6, 2004 - Fiction - 432 pages
New York Times bestselling author Jodi Picoult tells the story of a girl who decides to sue her parents for the rights to her own body in this riveting story that tackles a controversial subject with grace and explores what it means to be a good person.

Jodi Picoult is widely acclaimed for her keen insights into the hearts and minds of real people. Now she tells the emotionally powerful story of a family torn apart by conflicting needs and a passionate love that triumphs over human weakness.

Anna is not sick, but she might as well be. By age thirteen, she has undergone countless surgeries, transfusions, and shots so that her older sister, Kate, can somehow fight the leukemia that has plagued her since childhood. The product of preimplantation genetic diagnosis, Anna was conceived as a bone marrow match for Kate—a life and a role that she has never challenged...until now. Like most teenagers, Anna is beginning to question who she truly is. But unlike most teenagers, she has always been defined in terms of her sister—and so Anna makes a decision that for most would be unthinkable, a decision that will tear her family apart and have perhaps fatal consequences for the sister she loves.

My Sister’s Keeper examines what it means to be a good parent, a good sister, a good person. Is it morally correct to do whatever it takes to save a child’s life, even if that means infringing upon the rights of another? Is it worth trying to discover who you really are, if that quest makes you like yourself less? Should you follow your own heart, or let others lead you? Once again, in My Sister’s Keeper, Jodi Picoult tackles a controversial real-life subject with grace, wisdom, and sensitivity.
 

Selected pages

Contents

Monday
5
Tuesday
47
Wednesday
73
Thursday
139
Friday
201
The Weekend
241
Monday
285
Tuesday
341
Wednesday
357
Thursday
397
Epilogue
419
Kate
421
Copyright

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Page 1 - No one starts a war — or rather, no one in his senses ought to do so — without first being clear in his mind what he intends to achieve by that war and how he intends to conduct it.
Page 5 - Kin Brother, I am fire Surging under the ocean floor. I shall never meet you, brother— Not for years, anyhow; Maybe thousands of years, brother. Then I will warm you, Hold you close, wrap you in circles, Use you and change you— Maybe thousands of years, brother.

About the author (2004)

Jodi Picoult received an AB in creative writing from Princeton and a master’s degree in education from Harvard. The recipient of the 2003 New England Book Award for her entire body of work, she is the author of twenty-seven novels, including the #1 New York Times bestsellers House Rules, Handle With Care, Change of Heart, and My Sister’s Keeper, for which she received the American Library Association’s Margaret Alexander Edwards Award. She lives in New Hampshire with her husband and three children. Visit her website at JodiPicoult.com.

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