Sydney, Australia.
Cecilia Fitzpatrick had never aspired to anything other than ordinariness. She was a typical suburban mum:
- - everything in her home strictly stacked and labeled;
- her children, Isabel, Esther and Polly, on a precision course - perfectly calendered and co-ordinated;
- - her community life impeccable - President of St Angela’s Primary Parents and Citizens Association; and
- - the Tupperware queen of the region - one of the top eleven sales people in the country.
Her daughter Polly controlled the household with her obsessive interest in the Fall of the Berlin Wall.
Tess Curtis and her niece, formerly- fat Felicity, were spiritually bonded at the hip since birth, sharing everything. Until Tess was confronted with the ultimate request to share something she held the most dearest. She had to get away. She took her son Liam and flew back home.
Rachel Crowley lost her daughter, Janie, to a murder. Embittered, stubborn, resentful and lonely - especially when her son Rob announced his departure to New York with his wife and two-year-old son, she quietly built up a revenge she would unleash one sunny day, but was blinded by hatred, heartbreak and sorrow. Her impulsive action not only blew up in her face, but exploded like an atomic bomb in the community.
The families had two things in common: the television program, The Biggest Loser and the St Angela's Primary School.
All the husbands in the book are much-loved, much-admired and perfect. Well, most of the time...
But one man, Connor Whitby, would put the bubbles in the blood in a hen's pen, when he established himself as the Physical Exercise teacher in the school. Formerly a boring accountant, married to a equally boring ambitious lawyer, he started over by training his body and mind, buying a motorbike, and getting his biceps and six pack pumped up in the gym. The hormonal cocktail he gets stirred up have all the ladies, school girls and mamas in town huffing and puffing in his presence - everyone, except Rachel. Not because she was too old (women are never too old!) but because of her daughter Janie.
So, when Pandora toppled a shoe box in Cecilia's attic, and reveal a letter, addressed to her, to only be opened after the death of her husband John-Paul (who was still very much alive), the stage is set for an emotional, mental and physical avalanche of drama, adventure and stupefying endings.
I agreed with the ending. In fiction-country it is dumbfounding and might even make a few million revenge-driven mamas very angry, but in reality it was the best decisions. I liked it.
You got it right. I adored this book. There's heartbreak, humor and harlots. There's mediocrity, madness and mayhem. But most of all, it was all perfectly stringed together in the rosary of this community's life, which not even the thirty-year-old priest would be able to handle. If he knew what some of these women were thinking in his services, he would have made a run for it!
In the end we are left with the possibilities of what could have happened if......
Just amazing!
This book resonates with millions of women all over the world, staying for several weeks on the New York Times Best Seller List. I can clearly see why.
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