“The Storyteller” by Jodi Picoult – A Question of Morality

In The Storyteller by Jodi Picoult, we are introduced to Sage Singer. She runs her own bakery, spending her nights preparing the goods for the morning, hoping to escape the gaping emptiness that her life has become. 

Her head filled with memories of a past she’d rather forget, an acceptance of the reality that she is a lonely soul, and as if that wasn’t enough, she also has the passing of mother weighing down on her shoulders. One day though, she makes the acquaintance of an old man at her grief support group.

The man starts to stop by the bakery, and they develop a friendship, however unlikely it may be considering all of their differences. As they become more comfortable with each other, the old man, Josef, reveals to her a dark secret he hasn’t told anyone else before… and requests her help (I won’t say what exactly for fear of spoiling the story for you). 

If she is to accept, she may not only have to face certain legal consequences, but also some moral ones, leaving her at loss as to her own identity. She then starts to question the system of judgment and morality she has been using her entire life, trying to decide where to draw the line between justice and sadism?

Sage Singer makes for a very compelling main character, but I believe that Josef is the one who brought the best out of her. It’s through the interactions that she has with him that the story develops, that she starts to change and question her past as well as her future.

As a matter of fact, to me, the conversations between the two characters were some of the most notable parts of The Storyteller. This is one of those novels that is to be classified as more of a character study than anything else, using Sage as a vehicle for trying to find the answer to various moral questions. 

What’s more, I found it fascinating how Sage’s world changed so drastically and quickly upon making the discoveries she did, and yet she doesn’t really see things in black and white, but rather, she is simply a soul trying to find her way through this world and to see the truth about her life. A rather slow novel, but it’s one I’d recommend for the introspective mind.

---

Jodi Picoult Personal site Jodi Picoult is an American author who has had the honor of being awarded the 2003 New England Bookseller Award for Fiction. Her books have garnered popularity on an international level, with there being more than 14 million copies of her books in print, and counting. Some of her more famous novels (amongst the many she has written, of course) include The Pact and Salem Falls.