Review of Look Again

Today, I finished reading Look Again by Lisa Scottoline. The novel tells the story of a young reporter, Ellen, who adopted her son, Will, when he was abandoned by his parents in the hospital due to his severe health issues. While Ellen sorts through a stack of junk mail, she glimpses a photo of a child that strangely resembles Will. The photo is a flyer asking for help in locating a child that had been abducted several years before; the image on the flyer has been altered in order to show what the missing child might look like and could easily pass as a portrait of Ellen's son.

As the story continues, Ellen finds herself at a crisis of morality. Her instincts as a reporter want to find the truth of Will's identity at any cost. Her maternal nature wants to ignore the situation, knowing that if the unthinkable is true, the world as she and Will currently know it will cease to exist. Scottoline weaves a suspenseful tale of moral ambiguity while exploring the legal and emotional ramifications the scenerio would have upon all the adults involved in the child's life.

Chosen as one of the best books of the year (2009) by The Washington Post and a New York Times bestseller, Scottoline's narrative is a quick read while raising emotions at each turn. Just when you think you have figured out where things are going, Scottoline takes her characters into new territory, adding to the unfolding drama.

One of my favorite passages comes fairly late in the novel. While writing a newspaper piece on the love between a mother and her child, Ellen says of her son, Will:

I fell in love with Will the moment I saw him in a hospital ward, with tubes taped under his nose to hold them in place, fighting for his life. From that day forward, he was mine.

And though, as his mother, I certainly felt tired at times, I never tired of looking at him. I never tired of watching him eat. I never tired of hearing the sound of his voice or the words he made up, like the name of our cat. I never tired of seeing him play with Legos.

I did tire of stepping on them in bare feet.

It's hard to compare loves, and it may silly to try, but I have learned something. . . .

You may fall out of love with a man. But you will never fall out of love with your child. (Look Again, Scottoline, 333)

If you have a chance, I recommend picking up this riveting novel. On
the Freeman Scale of Quality Literature, I give Look Again a 7
out of 10. Those odds sound pretty good to me!

Happy reading!