Book 1 Project

In the book I read, Nineteen Minutes by Jodi Picoult, There’s a game that Peter Houghton creates in order to “practice” the school shooting he’s planning. Peter is the one guy in the whole school that every single person hates. Everyone in the “in” crowd calls him names and makes fun of him for having a crush on Josie. It really isn’t his fault because Peter and Josie were best friends until she became part of the “in” crowd in seventh grade. Now, their senior year, he still likes her but she’s dating the most popular guy, Matt. Okay so in the game you are a teenage boy with freckles and glasses. First, you have to pick your weapon. Then you run around the school and shoot the people that have made fun of peter. Actually creating the game would give readers a way to better understand the process Peter went through to kill ten people and shoot nineteen. 

The way Picoult writes is very different. She writes out of order so one chapter could be about the shooting and then the next is about what happened three years ago. This game is mentioned in the middle of the book but Peter creates it about a week before he actually takes the two hand guns and two sawed off shot guns to school to shoot twenty-nine people. This game mimics Peter running in through the front door, down the hall to the bathroom, around the corner to the cafeteria, then through the gym to the locker room. This is the pathway the computer game takes you to shoot other students and teachers. Peter was forced to use the stalls in the restroom because other guys would call him “homo”. Matt Royston pulled down Peter’s pants (and underwear) in front of the entire cafeteria. In gym he always picked last. In the locker room, the guys called him “homo” and broke his glasses in half. These events caused Peter to target those specific areas of the school to shoot.

This game could help broaden the audience by showing people who get bullied or computer game addicts that Jodi Picoult doesn’t just write “chick flicks”. Typically, Picoult writes stories that interest teenage girls because they’re about teenage girls and their problems. Yes this book revolves around Josie Cormier’s love triangle but Peter is the main character.  This could help encourage readers to stay connected with the book because, no judging, I was on Peter’s side. When he was being interviewed by the detective, Patrick Ducharme, Patrick asked why he did it and Peter said, “They started it” (Picoult). At first Peter is the antagonist because Josie is shown as the main character but as you keep reading you realize Peter only did it because Josie, Matt, Emma, Courtney, Drew, and Maddie provoked him. This game could help readers understand what Peter’s process was when running through the school and shooting.