Nineteen Minutes

by

Jodi Picoult

Alex Cormier Character Analysis

Josie’s mother and the youngest judge in New Hampshire. On the outside she is a hard-working, formidable woman who maintains a pristine reputation and finds it easy to fit in with a vast variety of social groups. However, inside Alex is plagued by uncertainty, particularly when it comes to her competence as a mother. Alex became pregnant with Josie at the age of 24 as the result of an affair with her married law professor, Logan Rourke. On discovering that Alex is pregnant, Logan encourages her to have an abortion, but Alex ends up keeping the baby and raising her as a single parent. While Alex lacks many of the skills traditionally believed to be “maternal,” such as cooking, she is a devoted mother who would do anything to protect Josie. After the shooting, Alex initially takes on the case as a judge, despite the fact that she has such a close connection to it and thus could be accused of bias. Under pressure, she eventually decides to recuse herself. Throughout this time she develops a romance with Patrick Duharme, a police detective also working on the case. At the end of the novel, Alex is pregnant with his child.

Alex Cormier Quotes in Nineteen Minutes

The Nineteen Minutes quotes below are all either spoken by Alex Cormier or refer to Alex Cormier. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Victims vs. Perpetrators Theme Icon
).
Part 1, Chapter 1: March 6, 2007 Quotes

You don’t stop being a judge just because you step out of the courthouse, her mother used to say. It was why Alex Cormier never drank more than one glass of wine in public; it was why she never yelled or cried. A trial was a stupid word, considering that an attempt was never good enough: you were supposed to toe the line, period. Many of the accomplishments that Josie’s mother was most proud of—Josie’s grades, her looks, her acceptance into the “right” crowd—had not been achieved because Josie wanted them so badly herself, but mostly because she was afraid of falling short of perfect.

Related Characters: Alex Cormier (speaker), Josie Cormier
Page Number: 9
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 1, Chapter 2: Seventeen Years Before Quotes

Everyone broke up in laughter, as Lacy watched. Alex, she realized, could fit anywhere. Here, or with Lacy’s family at dinner, or in a courtroom, or probably at tea with the queen. She was a chameleon.

It struck Lacy that she didn’t really know what color a chameleon was before it started changing.

Related Characters: Alex Cormier, Lacy Houghton
Page Number: 37
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 2, Chapter 1: Five Months After Quotes

“He used to like the peanut butter on the top half of the bread and the marshmallow fluff on the bottom.” Alex smiled a little. “And he had the longest eyelashes I’d ever seen on a little boy. He could find anything I’d dropped—an earring, a contact lens, a straight pin—before it got lost permanently.”

Related Characters: Alex Cormier (speaker), Peter Houghton
Page Number: 386
Explanation and Analysis:
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Alex Cormier Quotes in Nineteen Minutes

The Nineteen Minutes quotes below are all either spoken by Alex Cormier or refer to Alex Cormier. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Victims vs. Perpetrators Theme Icon
).
Part 1, Chapter 1: March 6, 2007 Quotes

You don’t stop being a judge just because you step out of the courthouse, her mother used to say. It was why Alex Cormier never drank more than one glass of wine in public; it was why she never yelled or cried. A trial was a stupid word, considering that an attempt was never good enough: you were supposed to toe the line, period. Many of the accomplishments that Josie’s mother was most proud of—Josie’s grades, her looks, her acceptance into the “right” crowd—had not been achieved because Josie wanted them so badly herself, but mostly because she was afraid of falling short of perfect.

Related Characters: Alex Cormier (speaker), Josie Cormier
Page Number: 9
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 1, Chapter 2: Seventeen Years Before Quotes

Everyone broke up in laughter, as Lacy watched. Alex, she realized, could fit anywhere. Here, or with Lacy’s family at dinner, or in a courtroom, or probably at tea with the queen. She was a chameleon.

It struck Lacy that she didn’t really know what color a chameleon was before it started changing.

Related Characters: Alex Cormier, Lacy Houghton
Page Number: 37
Explanation and Analysis:
Part 2, Chapter 1: Five Months After Quotes

“He used to like the peanut butter on the top half of the bread and the marshmallow fluff on the bottom.” Alex smiled a little. “And he had the longest eyelashes I’d ever seen on a little boy. He could find anything I’d dropped—an earring, a contact lens, a straight pin—before it got lost permanently.”

Related Characters: Alex Cormier (speaker), Peter Houghton
Page Number: 386
Explanation and Analysis: