Jodi Picoult scores A for effort with cult following
By Kathleen Noonan in The Courier Mail
April 03, 2009

JODI Picoult's fourth-grade teacher gave her an "F" for one of her writing assignments.
The fact that today she's a bestselling author of 16 novels, including two books that debuted on The New York Times bestseller list; has a film adaptation of one starring Cameron Diaz; receives 200 emails a day from devoted fans; owns a lakeside holiday house and is still talking about the dismal "F" mark, says something about her.

The question is: What?
"Am I a chronic over-achiever? Absolutely. Am I driven? Do I need to succeed? I'm a classic first-born child. I can't help myself," she says.

But more on that early criticism later.
First, we have to establish exactly which city Picoult, 42, is in and what book she's talking about. Simply because, at any one time, she is working on so many projects.

When we talk, she is at the Ritz in Atlanta, in the middle of a 30-city, 30-day book blitz of the United States, before a British tour to promote her latest book, Handle With Care, about a family struggling to deal with their daughter Willow's rare bone disease.
Just weeks earlier she had picked up proofs from the publisher of her 2010 book House Rules, about a teenager with Asperger's syndrome who ends up on trial for murder. And she's already figured out her 2011 book.
"I actually deliver books months, sometimes a year ahead of deadline."

Picoult – that's pronounced Pee-Koe – kicks off her latest book with a Raymond Carver quote: "And did you get what you wanted from this life, even so? I did. And what did you want? To call myself beloved, to feel myself beloved on the Earth."
So, does she need to feel beloved? "Well, I want to feel loved by the people who are important to me. And I want to make a difference in people's lives.
"I receive 200 emails a day from fans. They tell me things they've told no one."
And she replies to them all personally. Maybe that's why her devoted fans call their club the

Pi-Cult.

Picoult, whose favourite childhood book was Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell, says she doesn't need literary awards when she has sales in the millions.
"On tour, I'm averaging between 500 and 700 people at all my events," she says.

Read the full piece online.

Jodi Picoult's latest book Handle With Care is out in April.