At the top of her game, Jodi Picoult deals with thought provoking controversial issues. She populates her novels with good guys who are deeply flawed, and all the more human and identifiable for their foibles. And even the villains are redeemed and at least somewhat empathetic. She offers no pat answers and leaves the reader with something to ponder. But, when she’s off her game, Picoult slides into middle-of-the-pack “chick-lit.”

Picoult bites off a big chew with "Nineteen Minutes." She tackles the story of a bullied high school junior boy in suburban New Hampshire who shows up for school one day and guns down classmates, leaving 10 dead and about twice as many wounded. Picoult readers know where she’s headed; No one will be totally blameless and the boy will be fully dimensional and capable of our sympathy.

The “chick-lit” alarms ring early and often with passages like, “She’d thought that death could be an answer, because she was too immature to realize it was the biggest question of all” and also “and for a moment when he touched her, she actually thought she would slip through his fingers.” Picoult really pours on the syrup.

But surprisingly, less than half way through
"Nineteen Minutes," Picoult hits her stride and things start to click. She delivers a strong story that rises above the syrup. Picoult offers a powerful statement about the quest for popularity and to fit in, and the artificial stigma placed on those who don’t by the popular elite – “Popular kids didn’t have friends; they had alliances.” Her story is universally identifiable, for we all were once there and either “popular” or wished we were. And we were bullies or bullied or both, and we knew these kids and we recognize Picoult’s constructs, and as we read we remember the names of those in our schools that fit her molds.

Nineteen Minutes just misses being vintage Picoult. But it’s a worthy read and sometimes very touching