Fall sports are back on track, schools are hosting meet the teacher nights after a hiatus, and it’s almost as if the pandemic was a strange fever dream. Almost.
Before the
onslaught of her own senior year demands – AP homework, college applications,
and decorative jumpsuits - my daughter
read and recommended one of Jodi Picoult’s newest novels, Wish You Were Here.
Diana and
Finn are all set for their Galapagos Island vacation, planned for March of 2020.
However, Finn, a surgical resident at a New York City hospital feels compelled
to stay as the first COVID cases begin trickling in. Diana decides to go alone
and just manages to catch the last plane and ferry to a remote island as governments
around the world begin to impose lock-downs.*
With all
ties cut off to the rest of the world, Diana survives thanks the kindness of a
few locals, who we suspect are used to catering to the needs of thankless
American tourists. Although she gets sporadic emails from Finn, which truly
narrate the horrors patients, caregivers, and family members face in dealing
with this virus, Diana befriends a local nature guide who shows her the island’s
wonders. Which, as the reader discovers, are breathtaking in their own right.
*Apparently just
like the Witch who froze Narnia, according to my daughter’s English teacher.
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