Salem Falls

I recently read Salem Falls by Jodi Picoult for my book club. For those that don’t know I belong to a book club run by my local Library. She is an author that I was aware of prior to reading the book; my wife is a big fan. I was intrigued because it played itself off as a sequel of sorts to The Crucible by Arthur Miller. Her book references the play by Miller, but it seemed to pale by comparison. After speaking with several of the women in my book group that were fans of Picoult’s, I have to say I was disappointed. Many of the women said that this book followed the same formulas as her others. Even some the characters make repeat appearances in the same roles. The book smacked of being formulaic. Everything wrapped up nicely at the end.The story follows a teacher that is wrongly accused of sexual abuse with a student. He pleads guilty on the advice of his lawyer and does a short stint in prison. After his release and registration as a sex offender, he settles down in a little town. A girl from the local High School gets a crush and he is wrongly accused again. The book flashes from character to character in the telling of the story. One of the problems that I had was that all of the characters seemed to suffer some kind of sexual abuse. The book was full it, and seemed a little contrived.The entire thing felt like a made for TV movie. It was not bad, but it was not great either. I would have been a great beach read. I imagine that fans of Picoult’s will enjoy the book, but the rest of us need to keep in mind that this book was not written to be great it is simply entertainment.