The Pact

Until the phone calls came at three o'clock on a November morning, the Golds and their neighbors, the Hartes, had been inseparable. It was no surprise to anyone when their teenage children, Chris and Emily, began showing signs that their relationship was moving beyond that of lifelong friends. But now seventeen-year-old Emily is dead—shot with a gun her beloved and devoted Chris pilfered from his father's cabinet as part of an apparent suicide pact—leaving two devastated families stranded in the dark and dense predawn, desperate for answers about an unthinkable act and the children they never really knew.
From New York Times bestselling author Jodi Picoult—one of the most powerful writers in contemporary fiction—comes a riveting, timely, heartbreaking, and terrifying novel of families in anguish and friendships ripped apart by inconceivable violence.

“It’s hard to exaggerate how well Picoult writes.”  — Financial Times
“Picoult is a skilled wordsmith, and she beautifully creates situations that not only provoke the mind but touch the flawed souls in all of us.”  — Boston Globe
"Picoult always tells both sides of a story not with judgment, but with grace.”  — Washington Post
“Picoult is a writer who understands her characters inside and out.”  — Roxane Gay, New York Times Book Review