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Jodi Picoult Books in Order

The complete guide to Jodi Picoult’s books in order, with summaries, series details, and where to start reading.

Last updated: December 18, 2025

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41 books

By Any Other Name

by Jodi Picoult

2024

A dual-timeline novel linking a modern playwright to her ancestor, Emilia Bassano, the first published female poet in England. The story explores the theory that Emilia was the true author behind Shakespeare's plays.

Mad Honey

by Jodi Picoult

2022

Co-written with Jennifer Finney Boylan. When a teen girl is found dead, her boyfriend is accused of murder. His mother defends him, but as secrets about the victim's identity and the boy's family history emerge, the truth becomes complicated.

Choice

by Jodi Picoult

2022

A dystopian short story written in response to the overturning of Roe v. Wade. In a world where men are the ones who get pregnant, a man named James faces an unwanted pregnancy and the legal restrictions that come with it.

Broken Things

by Jodi Picoult

2022

A prequel short story to *Wish You Were Here*. It follows a young Diana O'Toole as she learns a hard lesson about priorities when her mother, a famous photographer, chooses her career over her daughter's tenth birthday.

Wish You Were Here

by Jodi Picoult

2021

Diana O'Toole is stranded in the Galápagos Islands when the COVID-19 pandemic shuts down the world. Cut off from her life in New York, she re-evaluates her entire future, only to discover that her isolation is not what it seems.

The Book of Two Ways

by Jodi Picoult

2020

After surviving a plane crash, a death doula finds herself thinking not of her husband, but of an old flame from her Egyptology days. She decides to pursue the path not taken, leading to a journey across the globe and into the past.

A Spark of Light

by Jodi Picoult

2018

A gunman bursts into a women's reproductive health clinic, taking hostages. Told in reverse chronological order, the story peels back the hours to reveal the intersecting lives of the staff, patients, and the negotiator outside.

Mermaid

by Jodi Picoult

2017

A fantasy short story about Hope Payne, a woman who was once a mermaid. Now married to a marine biologist, she must navigate a mysterious loss and decide if she is willing to sacrifice her new life to return to the water.

Small Great Things

by Jodi Picoult

2016

Ruth Jefferson, an experienced Black nurse, is ordered not to touch the baby of a white supremacist couple. When the baby goes into cardiac arrest and she hesitates, she is charged with murder, triggering a trial about race and privilege.

Shine

by Jodi Picoult

2016

A prequel short story to *Small Great Things*. It introduces Ruth Jefferson as a child starting at a prestigious new school, where she first encounters the subtle and overt racism that will shape her life and career.

Off the Page

by Jodi Picoult

2015

The sequel to *Between the Lines*. Oliver has finally escaped his book to be with Delilah, but the story he left behind is unraveling without him. They must fix the chaos in the fairy tale world before Oliver is pulled back forever.

Where There's Smoke

by Jodi Picoult

2014

A short story prequel to *Leaving Time* featuring Serenity Jones, a psychic medium. It explores her rise to fame and the disastrous reading that caused her to lose her confidence and career.

Leaving Time

by Jodi Picoult

2014

Jenna Metcalf has never stopped looking for her mother, an elephant researcher who vanished after a tragic accident. She teams up with a disgraced psychic and a jaded detective to uncover the truth, which is far stranger than she imagined.

Larger Than Life

by Jodi Picoult

2014

A novella set in the Botswana wilds. It serves as a prequel to *Leaving Time*, following Alice as she studies elephants and learns about the fierce protective bond between mothers and calves.

The Storyteller

by Jodi Picoult

2013

Sage Singer befriends a beloved old man in her grief support group, only to learn he was a Nazi SS officer. He asks her to help him die, forcing Sage to confront her own grandmother's Holocaust survival story and the limits of forgiveness.

The Color War

by Jodi Picoult

2013

A short story about a young boy named Raymond who attends a Bible camp for inner-city kids. He confronts issues of race, privilege, and the painful realization that good intentions aren't always enough to bridge the divide.

The Jodi Picoult Reader's Companion

by Jodi Picoult

2012

A non-fiction guide offering behind-the-scenes insights into Picoult’s novels, themes, and writing process. It serves as a resource for book clubs and dedicated fans wanting to dig deeper into her work.

Lone Wolf

by Jodi Picoult

2012

Luke Warren, a wolf researcher, is left in a vegetative state after a car accident. His two estranged children must decide whether to let him go or keep him alive, sparking a courtroom battle that tears the family apart.

Between the Lines

by Jodi Picoult

2012

Delilah hates high school but loves the fairy tale *Between the Lines*. She is shocked when Oliver, the book’s handsome prince, talks back to her. Together they hatch a plan to get him out of the story and into her world.

Sing You Home

by Jodi Picoult

2011

Music therapist Zoe Baxter fights for the right to use the frozen embryos she created with her ex-husband. When he converts to evangelical Christianity and remarries, the custody battle becomes a legal and religious firestorm over who defines a family.

Over the Moon

by Jodi Picoult

2011

A musical play co-written with her son, Jake van Leer. This fractured fairy tale follows Luna (the moon) as she descends to Earth disguised as a boy to help humans find love, only to fall in love herself.

Leaving Home

by Jodi Picoult

2011

A collection of three short pieces exploring the theme of departure. It includes two short stories—one about grief, one about a mother's vacation—and a personal letter Picoult wrote to her son as he left for college.

House Rules

by Jodi Picoult

2010

Jacob Hunt, a teenager with Asperger's syndrome and an obsession with forensic science, is accused of murdering his tutor. His behaviors, often misread by police as guilt, force his mother to fight a legal system that doesn't understand him.

Handle with Care

by Jodi Picoult

2009

A family struggles to pay for the medical care of their daughter, who has a severe brittle-bone disease. The mother makes a controversial decision to sue her obstetrician—her best friend—for wrongful birth, arguing she should have had the option to abort.

Change of Heart

by Jodi Picoult

2008

A death row inmate offers to donate his heart to the sister of the victim he was convicted of killing. The story questions the nature of redemption, the death penalty, and whether a miracle can come from a murderer.

Wonder Woman #10

by Jodi Picoult

2007

The conclusion to Picoult’s five-issue run on the series. Wonder Woman faces a final confrontation involving her mother, Hippolyta, and the sorceress Circe, resolving the 'Love and Murder' storyline.

Nineteen Minutes

by Jodi Picoult

2007

After years of bullying, a student opens fire at his high school, changing the town of Sterling forever. The novel explores the shooting from multiple perspectives—the shooter, the victims, and the judge whose own daughter is a witness.

Love and Murder

by Jodi Picoult

2007

A graphic novel collecting issues #6–10 of *Wonder Woman*. Diana Prince is assigned to capture Wonder Woman—her own alter ego—while battling the sorceress Circe and navigating complex Amazonian politics.

The Tenth Circle

by Jodi Picoult

2006

When a comic book artist's teenage daughter claims she was raped, the family fractures. The father, who draws superheroes for a living, struggles with his own desire for vengeance, blurring the line between his ink-and-paper justice and reality.

Vanishing Acts

by Jodi Picoult

2005

Delia Hopkins has led a charmed life until she remembers a repressed memory that suggests her beloved father kidnapped her as a child. As he faces trial, Delia must decide if the man who raised her is a criminal or a hero.

My Sister's Keeper

by Jodi Picoult

2004

Anna was conceived to be a marrow donor for her leukemia-stricken sister, Kate. At thirteen, she sues her parents for medical emancipation to stop the procedures. The lawsuit exposes deep family fractures and asks who owns a child's body.

Second Glance

by Jodi Picoult

2003

In a town plagued by inexplicable events, a ghost hunter is hired to prove a property isn't haunted so a developer can build a mall. Instead, he uncovers a murder mystery from the 1930s involving eugenics and a love story that refuses to die.

Perfect Match

by Jodi Picoult

2002

A district attorney who has spent her career putting criminals behind bars takes the law into her own hands when her five-year-old son is abused. She finds herself on the other side of the courtroom, forced to defend an indefensible act.

Salem Falls

by Jodi Picoult

2001

A teacher with a past conviction for sexual assault moves to a small town for a fresh start. He finds love and a simple life until a group of teenage girls accuses him of a crime, forcing the town to decide if history is repeating itself.

Plain Truth

by Jodi Picoult

2000

A dead infant is found in an Amish barn, and an eighteen-year-old Amish girl denies she was ever pregnant. A high-profile defense attorney, hiding in the community to escape her own life, agrees to defend her in a clash of cultures and justice.

Keeping Faith

by Jodi Picoult

1999

After a messy divorce, a young girl begins talking to an invisible friend who might be God. When she starts performing apparent miracles, her mother must fight a custody battle against a father who uses the religious controversy to claim she is unfit.

The Pact

by Jodi Picoult

1998

Two teenagers, inseparable since birth, are found shot in a swimming pool; one is dead, the other holds the gun. The surviving boy claims it was a suicide pact, but the investigation unravels a lifetime of secrets between their two families.

Mercy

by Jodi Picoult

1996

Police chief Cameron McDonald is forced to arrest his own cousin for the mercy killing of his terminally ill wife. The trial tears the town apart, while Cameron struggles with his own marriage and the blurred lines between love and the law.

Picture Perfect

by Jodi Picoult

1995

Cassie Barrett wakes up in a cemetery with no memory of who she is or how she got there. When her handsome, famous husband arrives to take her home, she discovers a life that looks perfect on the outside but hides a dangerous reality.

Harvesting the Heart

by Jodi Picoult

1993

Paige O'Toole, haunted by the memory of the mother who abandoned her, leaves her own husband and newborn to find herself. She traces her mother's path, eventually learning that she must confront her past to stop running from her future.

Songs of the Humpback Whale

by Jodi Picoult

1992

Picoult's debut novel tracks a mother who flees her crumbling marriage in San Diego, taking her daughter across the country to her brother's apple farm in Massachusetts. Told through five different voices, it explores the weight of secrets and the complexity of love.

Where should I start?

If you want her most famous courtroom drama: My Sister's Keeper
If you prefer a high-stakes thriller about a school shooting: Nineteen Minutes
If you want a powerful story about race and prejudice: Small Great Things
If you like historical fiction with a modern twist: The Storyteller

Author bio

Jodi Picoult is a storyteller at heart. Born in Long Island, New York, in 1966, she started writing very early. While most five-year-olds were drawing stick figures, Picoult was already writing tragedies. Her first story was titled The Lobster Which Misunderstood. It was a sad tale about a lobster who peeked into a pot of boiling water and thought it looked like a nice, warm bath. That early mix of emotion and drama would eventually become her trademark.

She took that passion for words to the Ivy League. She studied creative writing at Princeton University and later earned a master’s degree in education from Harvard. However, she didn't wait for the "perfect" moment to start her career as an author. She wrote her debut novel, Songs of the Humpback Whale, while she was pregnant with her first child. It was a busy start to a very busy career, and she hasn't really slowed down since.

Picoult is now one of the most productive authors working today. She is famous for writing books that feel like they were "ripped from the headlines." She doesn't shy away from the hard stuff. She picks topics that make people argue at dinner parties. She writes about school shootings, medical rights, religion, racism, and the law.

Her secret weapon is how she tells these stories. She rarely uses just one narrator. Instead, she writes from multiple opposing points of view. In a single book, you might hear from a victim, a lawyer, a mother, and even the person accused of a crime. This style forces readers to walk in everyone's shoes. It makes it hard to see the world in simple black and white, often leaving the reader unsure of where they stand until the very last page.

Her research is known for being incredibly intense. She doesn't just sit at a desk and guess. She goes out into the world to learn. Over the years, she has shadowed lawyers, interviewed prisoners, watched surgeries, and spent time with Amish communities. She wants every detail to feel real, even if it is fiction.

Her list of books is huge, but a few titles stand out as fan favorites. My Sister’s Keeper broke hearts all over the world with its story about medical ethics and family duty. Nineteen Minutes took a hard look at the bullying and isolation surrounding a school shooting. Small Great Things tackled the heavy subject of race and prejudice in the medical system.

But she isn't just a novelist. She holds a very cool record in the comic book world, too.

Picoult was the first woman to ever write a Wonder Woman comic arc for DC. It was a fun detour from her usual heavy, realistic dramas, but it showed she could write for just about any audience.

Today, she lives in New Hampshire with her husband, Tim. They have three children and have created a quiet life away from the city. When she isn't working on her next bestseller, she is usually doing one of two things.

First, she might be found in the kitchen. She is an avid baker and loves making complicated desserts to share online.

Second, she is likely fighting for the right to read. Picoult is a loud and passionate voice against book bans in the United States. She believes stories help us understand each other, and she fights hard to keep diverse books on library shelves. Whether she is writing a court drama or baking a meringue, she puts her whole heart into it.

Edited by

Richard Reis

Software engineer whose passion for tracking book recommendations from podcasts inspired the creation of MRB.

Anurag Ramdasan

Lead investor at 3one4 Capital whose startup expertise and love for books helped shaped MRB and its growth.

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All 41 Jodi Picoult Books in Order (Complete List 2026)