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Nineteen Minutes Essay

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Nineteen Minutes, written by Jodi Picoult is a thriller that is about a school shooting that happened in a small town. The book shows the lifespan of the two main characters, 17-year-olds Josie Cormier and Peter Houghton. Josie and Peter grew up being close friends, but like many friendships, high school separated them. Peter Houghton was bullied all throughout school, until one day he began shooting the people he grew up with. I believe that after reading Nineteen Minutes I grew as a person. Reading Nineteen Minutes changed the way I see my classmates, the world, and let me understand how many people are truly affected. During the novel, I felt a whirlwind of emotions from all the characters, especially Peter. Nineteen Minutes portrays …show more content…

In the novel Peter Houghton’s mother, Lacy Houghton couldn’t fathom the fact that the son she had raised had so much hate in her that he would kill his fellow classmates. While talking to her husband after the chaotic event, Lacy said, "Can you hate someone for what they have done, but still love them for whom they had been?" (Picoult, 248). These families that have this happen to them face this feeling of shame because they feel that they could have done something else to fix it. I was heartbroken for Lacy knowing that she was blaming herself for something her son did. I could not even imagine what my mom would do if I was in Peter’s situation. In an interview with Sue Klebold, the mother of one of the two Columbine High School shooters, she states “I had raised a murderer without knowing it” she also revealed that when finding out the news that her son was a suspect with this outrage, she prayed suddenly for her son's death. She soon found out that he had committed suicide in the school library (McShane, 2016). Often people, including myself only think of the ones that were physically involved, but now realizing the grief that family members have to go through is

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