Change of Heart #2 Q1

Sometimes endings to novels are very predictable and some endings seem to come out of nowhere. In Change of Heart by Jodi Picoult, the ending was some what predictable but there were a couple details that surprised me very much. Through out the entire novel, Shay Bourne is to blame for the murders of Kurt and Elizabeth Nealon. However, at the end, we find out that Shay was trying to save Elizabeth from being sexually abused by her stepfather Kurt. Shay kills Kurt but Kurt accidentally shot Elizabeth while trying to save himself. Jodi Picoult made Shay Bourne look like the bad guy in the novel, but in reality he was just trying to help and he was the only one left to blame. This came as a very big surprise to me because there were no hints that led to Kurt sexually abusing Elizabeth, and being the one who actually killed his own daughter. Also, at the end of the novel, Shay Bourne had to die because of his sentence of the death penalty. That was predictable because sentences like that usually do not second guess themselves. However, characters in the novel like Father Michael and Maggie were trying their best to postpone his death until they figured out what to do with his heart and Claire Nealon. When Shay did die, he donated his heart to Elizabeth. The novel was very "wishy-washy" about the outcome of Claire and Shay's heart, one chapter they were going to accept the heart, the next they were hesitant because of who was the donor. This made the ending of the novel hard to predict because I was not sure what was actually going to happen and kept me want to keep reading to find out the outcome.
 I really liked the ending of the novel because it was very different from any other novel. The entire plot was kind of flipped when it was revealed that Kurt was sexually abusing his daughter and Shay was trying to stop it. It made me really think about into the story and how Shay felt so bad for the family. It did not make sense before because he should not have cared, but since he was trying to help, I understand why he felt so bad and wanted to donate his heart. I also liked how Claire and her mother decided to accept the heart transplant and save Claire's life. June Nealon found out the truth about her husband and came to the conclusion that accepting the heart from Shay Bourne would help her daughter and have a piece of the man who tried to help save her other daughter Elizabeth. Jodi Picoult did a great job with the ending of the novel, and made it an even better story with the twists at the end.