I almost wish I wasn't reading this book - or any of her books. Right from the start I get sucked in and turn page after page - and forget about any kind of life I might have at the moment. This does the same thing. Picoult doesn't shy away from a tough subject (COVID) but she pulls it off with ease. But the pandemic is really a way for her to reflect on how her (main character is Diana) life has been, where it's going, and what she wants out of life. I enjoyed the descriptions of Galapagos Island. Also makes me introspective of my own life.

This is Jodi Picoult at her finest, in my opinion. I absolutely loved this book. I loved that she surprised me, and wounded me, and I love that she left me a with strong sense of hope and a newfound feeling of peacefulness and gratitude. Did I expect anything less? Nope. But Picoult delivers. Every time.

The story takes place at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic and follows the lives of Diana and her boyfriend Finn. The two had saved up all of their money to take a trip to the Galapagos Islands when tragedy struck the world, and Finn, working as a surgical resident in a NY hospital, could not join Diana on the vacation of a lifetime.

Reluctantly, Diana leaves without Finn and the two try their best to communicate with spotty (at best) service in The Galapagos and Finn's overly stretched schedule in the hospital serving the medical needs of so many patients who have recently become infected by Covid-19.

Without giving too much away, this book SHOCKED me. I was not prepared. And I could not read it fast enough!

Thank you so much to Netgalley and the publisher, Ballantine Books, for this advanced copy of Wish You Were Here in exchange for my honest review. 5-stars out of 5.

I get what the author did with this book, but this was super disappointing. Everyone was talking about it and unfortunately I didn’t enjoy it. I didn’t like our main character and the route this book took annoyed me. It felt way too ridiculous!

I was originally nervous about picking this book up due to the last few years with COVID and the struggle every person has had with dealing with their own emotions as well as those around them. Although, I will say Picoult really knows how to get her readers to feel all their emotions as well as the characters feelings.

Diana, the main character, has her life planned and set the way that she wants it and that all changes when her boyfriend has to stay in the city while she goes on their trip to the Galapagos on her own. Her trip continues to spiral out of her control when the island is shut down for quarantine and she must accept what is happening. Fully recommend this book if you are ready to feel out your own feelings dealing with COVID and ready to go along for a ride with the narrator.

My favorite book by this author to date! I couldn’t put it down! I thought because it deals with Covid and the pandemic it may feel off putting, but it wasn’t at all. And that ending!!! I need an epilogue!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for my copy for an honest review.

Thank you to Netgalley & Jodi Picoult for my copy of Wish You We’re Here, for an honest review. It was my pleasure to read and review this this book.. it really made think. Diane O’Toole is on the right track in life. She has plans and she is checking off accomplishments all the time. She has a great job at Sotheby’s, an auction house. It is a competitive job and she is really doing well. She has a perfect fiancée.. a doctor and they have a beautiful apartment. Things are so good they her & Finn are planning to go to the Galapagos. She could just pinch herself, life is that good. Until March of 2020 and the Corona Virus hits the Us and the world stands still. No one knows what is happening or going to happen. Finn decides that Diana should go in the trip. He thinks it’s best to get her out of the city, anywhere has to be safer than NY. She heads off to the Galapagos, with hesitation because there are so many unknown’s. Once in the island things aren’t much calmer and the last ferry is leaving as she lands on the island. She has to make a decision to go or stay quickly. She decides to stay.. her adventures begin in the island and is having a good time. There is no signs of Covid and the sun is healing. She has little contact with Finn.. and she finds she isn’t missing him, that much.
Meanwhile NY City is a mess. So many people are sick and dying. Not enough doctors, nurses and hospital staff. Finn is so busy he can barely think.. there is an awesome twist in this story.. The second half of this story flew by. It was so good. I don’t want to give anything away, but it is good.
This story is well written and I really enjoyed the characters.
The twist had me thinking about it well after I finished the book. I hope you enjoy it as much I did.

I usually love Jodi Picoult books, but I just couldn’t get into this one. I was very disappointed. I felt that it was slow. I really wanted to give it a 3.5 stars, but can’t on goodreads or here. I am not sure I would recommend this book.

This was such a beautiful written book. The details were so vivid and really created a picture. It was a bit tough to break into for me, and living in the pandemic it's hard to read about it in fictional worlds as well, which are usually an escape. However, this book broke through that to me, and was very special.

Unsurprisingly Jodi Picoult has her finger on the pulse of the what is happening. The writing is beautiful. The story captures what is happening in the times of COVID. The fear of the unknown and well …..everything. What happens when you wind up far from home all alone on what you thought would be a romance filled holiday with the love of your life and must face every fear you’ve ever had? Will you find within yourself to discover who you really are and what you are capable of? And when you do, when can you go back to living the life before? This is that story. I don’t want to give away anything so have a little faith and go along for the ride. It’s a wonderful journey.

Although I write science fiction and fantasy, I’m a diehard Jodi Picoult fan. She has the almost magical ability to take a current issue and spin it into a compelling, human story that transcends the news of the day.
Wish You Were Here opens with art auction specialist Diana and her fiancé, Finn, regretfully cancelling their dream vacation to the Galápagos Islands. It’s March, 2020, and Finn is a resident in surgery in a New York City hospital…and it’s all hands on deck in the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Immediately I was hooked, not just from the drama of the unfolding crisis we all lived through, but because my younger daughter was then in her final year of residency in Family Medicine. Instead of the usual rotation of specialties (such as surgery or pediatrics) she spent that last year caring for desperately ill Covid patients. Watching them die alone. Coming home to her wife exhausted, shift after brutal shift, when she got to come home at all.

I knew what was coming for Finn, even if he and Diana didn’t.

At Finn’s insistence, Diana goes off to the Galápagos by herself. First she loses her luggage, then, just after she arrives, the islands are locked down. Her hotel is closed and there’s no wi-fi. By gradual steps she’s drawn into the beauty of the islands and their animals, and the lives of the people there. Although she and Finn can’t talk directly, she writes him postcards about her adventures, and he sends her emails.

Without divulging any spoilers, Diana’s carefully planned life quickly unravels as she embraces the beauty and serenity of the islands and its people.

I found Diana’s stories about her time on the islands rather placid or perhaps idyllic, given the benign climate, isolation, and low threat of violence. The tension revolves primarily around Diana’s relationships, marred only by her frustration at not being able to contact Finn. But Finn’s emails, so strongly resonant of my daughter’s experiences with death, exhaustion, and burnout, hit home, and hit me hard. As the book unfolded, I realized that, in Picoult’s skillful hands, the contrast is not only deliberate but significant. Such intense, tragic experiences change us forever.

This was one of the first novels that have read that dealt with the pandemic. Beautifully told with a heart wrenching twist that you will not see coming.

4/5 stars for me! I typically don’t like books centered around Covid since that’s been our world for the past 2 years, but this one tugged at my heartstrings and was the perfect mix of Covid in the story.

Going into a book that centered around the start of the pandemic, I knew that it would evoke a number of emotions. Even after two years, we all still remember those early days of uncertainty and all the measures taken to try and feel just an ounce of safety in our homes.

WISH YOU WERE HERE went far beyond what I initially expected when I cracked open this book. Picoult wove a fictional story that was tied to a very real and shared experience that many people will never forget. I appreciated the character development, especially with Diana, and how her life and outlook changed as she progressed throughout the book. I also thought the writing really captured the depth of emotions felt by many people at this time.

As always, Picoult’s extensive research can be seen throughout the book and I appreciated the author’s note at the end that highlighted her own personal experience during this time. I really enjoyed WISH YOU WERE HERE and thought it was a bit different from Picoult’s prior work, which I found fitting after reflecting on the last two years.

Here’s a book I didn’t know I needed. I’m a huge fan of JP, but don’t let that discredit this review. This book is a fascinating viewpoint of the pandemic that was vastly different from my
own experience. It’s rich in description and scenery, it’s lush in the art world and it’s deep in the depravity of NYC hospitals during the worst of the pandemic. Not only does the storytelling feel like vintage Jodi Picoult in the best way, but the character development is captivating and beautiful. There were times I couldn’t put the book down because I was enjoying the actual story so much. I didn’t honestly want to read a book about the pandemic while we’re still living it but I’m so glad I did.

Diana and Finn have distinct voices that are so compulsively readable it’s mesmerizing. I loved these characters and felt equally captivated by both of their experiences. At times heartbreaking and cruel, Wish You Were Here is exactly what the doctor ordered: a reminder to live in the moment, and appreciate the smallest of details knowing the next isn’t guaranteed. And when the world forces you to press pause, try to look around and appreciate the view.

I have such mixed emotions about this book. I was so intrigued by the first half. I mean what if you were trapped on a foreign island when the pandemic hit? It would be just as terrifying and fascinating and isolating as Picoult made it sound.

Then the classic twist that happens in her books occurs half way through and - it just felt like it was too soon to be digging into this. I know that this book will hold up as a reflection of the hidden parts of the suffering of COVID like the toll on health workers and the physical therapy for those who had to be intubated it was just still too raw and close to reality. for me to enjoy this as fiction.

Diana seems to be on the verge of having it all - the dream boyfriend who's about to propose, a major project at work that should land her a promotion - when COVID hits, and she ends up going alone on a vacation to the Galapagos and getting stranded as the world shuts down. However, things are not as they seem - get ready for some major twists and turns! I found the first half of the book pretty slow, and Diana to be incredibly entitled and unlikeable, but the plot twist got me really interested again. I read with avid interest the emails from Diana's boyfriend Finn, describing his experience as an exhausted surgeon as COVID ravaged the city - I wished the whole book had been about this! But with the plot twist halfway through, I kind of got my wish. Meanwhile, while the book seemed at face value to be a bit woo-woo and imaginary, the author's note at the end suggested that perhaps we don't know as much as we think about comas, dying, and what the people who go through those truly experience. I would recommend it, but it wasn't my favorite of Picoult's books.

This was my first from the wildly popular Jodi Picoult in a long, long while. Perhaps it was too soon for me to read a pandemic book. It was good, yes, and I did not see the big twist coming. I think that perhaps this will be better a few years down the road, possibly as a good piece of period fiction? It was a good read, but I can't say that I was a fan of the main character or her choices. Very well written; fair read; will be popular with patrons.

I received a copy of this novel as an advanced reader copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Jodi Picoult knows how to write with suspense and keep the reader interested and engaged. Love the Galapagos island setting.

I have read most of Jodi Picoult's work - she is definitely a favorite author of mine - I enjoyed this novel - at first I wasn't so sure but once Diana O’Toole got to the Galápagos Islands I was all in - I was wishing that I could of spent my Covid quarantine there as well. One does have to suspend disbelief a bit regarding Diana's decision to go on the long planned trip at the first outbreak of the pandemic - when her boyfriend, Finn, a surgical resident, decides he needs to stay at the hospital. But, hey, without the knowledge of what was to come with the pandemic, I might of made the decision to go as well. Picoult's descriptive prose reads beautifully and puts you right on the island. I love that she weaves the mystical and magical into many of her later novels. This would be a good book club novel as would most of her novels. I enjoyed the read - thanks Mrs. Picoult!

I really loved this. It took me back to the beginning of the pandemic, when everything was upside down. This recent history was woven into such a wonderful story that it made reliving this part of 2020 bearable, in an achingly beautiful sort of way. I could also really relate to the main character, and felt so much like her during many moments in the story. Even now, a few days later, these characters are still running circles in my head, and I can't seem to quite let them go yet.

Additionally, the plot was extremely intriguing and kept me absolutely glued to the book, so much so that I basically read this book in one sitting. Although some of the heroine's actions made me question things, the twist still caught me completely by surprise, which always makes for a better reading experience! I also adored the writing, and it felt so heartfelt throughout. I loved absolutely every second, and was so sad to see the final page go by.

Overall, while I've been a Jodi Picoult fan for a while, this book only seemed to strengthen my appreciation for her writing further, and I'm excited to see what she comes up with next!