"Small Great Things" by Jodi Picoult

Small Great Things is the story of an African-American nurse named Ruth Jefferson who gets blamed for a death of an infant and gets arrested and tried for murder. The child's parents are white supremacists who had insisted that Ruth be removed from caring for their son. However, when another patient is rushed to an emergency C-section, Ruth finds herself alone with the baby boy, when he unexpectedly goes into distress.

This book is phenomenal. The characters are very well-defined, the plot is well-thought out and nuanced, and the themes are poignant and very close to my heart. I listened to this book on audio and I highly recommend the audiobook. The novel is written from three different points of view: Ruth's; Turk Bower's, the white supremacist whose son died; and Kennedy's, Ruth's public defendant. All three readers did a great job. They all sounded very authentic and truly brought the characters to life.

The thing that I appreciated the most about this book is Picoult's deep dive into the meaning of white privilege. Her assertion that ignorance (and the root here to think about is "ignore") is just another facet of privilege. People of color do not get to be ignorant about issues of race. They live it daily. This is a powerful and much needed book. I devoured it and could not get enough of it. I highly recommend it. 5 out of 5 stars.