The Other Half – Sarah Rayner

Contemporary Fiction
4*’s

I imagine writing about adultery is more problematic than a lot of subjects due to the stance women often take on the subject.  I live on a small island and so conducting an affair in secret is very hard, one or other of the pair is always going to be seen and remarked on and at most you have a couple of days before you are being gossiped about from one end of the island to the other!  This comment, I hasten to add, isn’t from personal experience but from conversations from friends, and yes, the gossip that has reached my shell-like ears!  Now generally, I’ve found the behaviour that is taken apart and dissected by these dedicated arbitrators is reserved for the women, it appears that everyone has an opinion on the girl who is sleeping with the married man, speculation about how the wife should behave or what she may have done to drive him to commit adultery.  Far rarer is it that the man who has broken his wedding vows is treated to the same treatment, especially if it is the first time he has strayed.  So books about affairs intrigue me as I like to see how different authors approach this contentious issue.

The Other Half  starts by describing good time Chloe, an up and coming star in the world of women’s magazines who goes for a drink with her boss, James and ends up taking him to bed with her.  Chloe is trying to pitch an idea for a new magazine which is different (a concept that is long overdue in my opinion) and his contacts could be the break she needs.

Later on we get to know Maggie, the perfect wife, a well-known food writer who is well groomed and more sensible than Chloe.  James and Maggie have a six year old son Nathan and as readers we witness her humiliation at a dinner party they are hosting.  You see, although this reads far more like chick-lit than her previous novels there is a depth to the writing that I enjoy in Sarah Rayner’s books.

From these alternating views of their lives I found I was sympathetic to both women, they are different and both want more from James which to my mind perfectly replicates every affair that I have ever heard about.   Sarah Rayner has been clever allowing her readers to see James up close and personal from the beginning and not by painting him as an awful man, but depicting a situation which to my mind is realistic. While Chloe is extolling his good points we have an insight into a different side to James, a man who, like most of us, doesn’t have all the answers to explain his behaviour.

This is one of those books that I fairly rattled through, as a light read with a more solid centre, this was a familiar tale, not told so much with a twist, but maybe with a level of understanding of all the protagonists, in what is not an unfamiliar tale.  I don’t want to spoil the plot in any way but the ending was fitting, as it had to be, bearing in mind the subject matter!

I was grateful to receive a free copy of this book from St Martin’s Press ahead of the publication date of 25 March 2014 in return for my written opinion.

WWW Wednesday (March 12)

Hosted by Miz B at Should be Reading
To play along, just answer the following three (3) questions…
• What are you currently reading?
• What did you recently finish reading?
• What do you think you’ll read next?

I am currently reading The Toy Taker which is the third in the DI Corrigan Series written by former Detective is certainly feeling authentic!

Blurb

Your child has been taken…
Snatched in the dead of night from the safety of the family home. There’s no sign of forced entry, no one heard or saw a thing.
DI Sean Corrigan investigates.
He needs to find four-year-old George Bridgeman before abduction becomes murder. But his ability to see into dark minds, to think like those he hunts, has deserted him – just when he needs it most.
Another child vanishes.
What kind of monster is Corrigan hunting? And will he work it out in time to save the children? Goodreads

I have recently finished reading the epic dual time-line tale of Anahita Chevran with the historical setting around World War I
Click on the book cover to read my review.

Next I am going to read The Other Half by Sarah Rayner, an author I love for her realistic portrayal of characters.

Blurb

Chloe, bright, hip and single, is a feature writer with ambitions to launch a magazine of her own. When she meets James, her potential new boss, she knows she shouldn’t mix business with pleasure, but finds it impossible to resist… Maggie appears to have it all. She’s beautiful, a talented writer, and has a gorgeous husband. But something’s not quite right: his job as a magazine publisher is keeping him in the city until late most evenings, and some nights he doesn’t come home at all… Told in the alternating voices of the mistress and the wife, this story of an affair is a sharp, seductive take on modern love. Who, if anyone, comes out unscathed? NetGalley

What are you reading this week? Please share your link or let me know by leaving a comment.

Friday Finds (February 28)

Hosted by Should be Reading

FRIDAY FINDS showcases the books you ‘found’ and added to your To Be Read (TBR) list… whether you found them online, or in a bookstore, or in the library — wherever! (they aren’t necessarily books you purchased).

So, come on — share with us your FRIDAY FINDS!

Well here we are at the end of February and my TBR continues to grow at a fair old rate

From NetGalley this week I have The Accident by C.L. Taylor which is due to be published on 10 April 2014.

Blurb

Sue Jackson has the perfect family but when her teenage daughter Charlotte deliberately steps in front of a bus and ends up in a coma she is forced to face a very dark reality.
Retracing her daughter’s steps she finds a horrifying entry in Charlotte’s diary and is forced to head deep into Charlotte’s private world. In her hunt for evidence, Sue begins to mistrust everyone close to her daughter and she’s forced to look further, into the depths of her own past.
Sue will do anything to protect her daughter. But what if she is the reason that Charlotte is in danger? NetGalley

I also have a copy of The Other Half by Sarah Rayner whose writing I love and even better it chronicles an affair and I haven’t read about adultery for a while! This one will be published on 25 March 2014.

Blurb

Chloe, bright, hip and single, is a feature writer with ambitions to launch a magazine of her own. When she meets James, her potential new boss, she knows she shouldn’t mix business with pleasure, but finds it impossible to resist…
Maggie appears to have it all. She’s beautiful, a talented writer, and has a gorgeous husband. But something’s not quite right: his job as a magazine publisher is keeping him in the city until late most evenings, and some nights he doesn’t come home at all… Told in the alternating voices of the mistress and the wife, this story of an affair is a sharp, seductive take on modern love. Who, if anyone, comes out unscathed? In writing that is lively, sexy and sharp, the international bestselling author Sarah Rayner explores modern-day relationships and age-old moral dilemmas. NetGalley

From Amazon Vine I chose Precious Thing by Colette McBeth, a book I have been interested in for a while but had resisted until the willpower melted away.

Blurb

I know her inside out. I know what she’s thinking, I know what she wants. So I can’t give up on her, she knows I never will.
Some friendships fizzle out. Rachel and Clara promised theirs would last forever.
They met in high school when Rachel was the shy, awkward new girl and Clara was the friend everyone wanted. Instantly, they fell under one another’s spell and nothing would be the same again. Now in their late twenties Rachel has the television career, the apartment and the boyfriend, while Clara’s life is spiraling further out of control. Yet despite everything, they remain inextricably bound. Then Rachel’s news editor assigns her to cover a police press conference, and she is shocked when she arrives to learn that the subject is Clara, reported missing. Is it abduction, suicide or something else altogether?
Imagine discovering something about your oldest friend that forces you to question everything you’ve shared together. The truth is always there. But only if you choose to see it. Goodreads

Erin Kelly has another book due to be published in May so The Ties That Bind and since The Burning Air was on my top 10 of 2013, this had to go onto the TBR in readiness.

Blurb

Could a soul, once sold, truly be redeemed?
Luke is a true crime writer in search of a story. When he flees to Brighton after an explosive break-up, the perfect subject lands in his lap: reformed gangster Joss Grand. Now in his eighties, Grand once ruled the Brighton underworld with his sadistic sidekick Jacky Nye – until Jacky washed up by the West Pier in 1968, strangled and thrown into the sea. Though Grand’s alibi seems cast-iron, Luke is sure there’s more to the story than meets the eye, and he convinces the criminal-turned-philanthropist to be interviewed for a book about his life.
Luke is drawn deeper into the mystery of Jacky Nye’s murder. Was Grand there that night? Is he really as reformed a character as he claims? And who was the girl in the red coat seen fleeing the murder scene? Soon Luke realises that in stirring up secrets from the past, he may have placed himself in terrible danger.Goodreads

Lastly I have added The Farm by Tom Rob Smith to my TBR after seeing it mentioned on FictionFan’s TBR Thursday

Blurb

Until the moment he received a frantic call from his father, Daniel believed his parents were headed into a peaceful, well-deserved retirement. They had sold their home and business in London, and said “farewell to England” with a cheerful party where all their friends had gathered to wish them well on their great adventure: setting off to begin life anew on a remote, bucolic farm in rural Sweden.
But with that phone call, everything changes. Your mother’s not well, his father tells him. She’s been imagining things–terrible, terrible things. She’s had a psychotic breakdown, and has been committed to a mental hospital.
Daniel prepares to rush to Sweden, on the first available flight the next day. Before he can board the plane, his father contacts him again with even more frightening news: his mother has been released from the hospital, and he doesn’t know where she is.
Then, he hears from his mother:
I’m sure your father has spoken to you. Everything that man has told you is a lie. I’m not mad. I don’t need a doctor. I need the police. I’m about to board a flight to London. Meet me at Heathrow.
Caught between his parents, and unsure of who to believe or trust, Daniel becomes his mother’s unwilling judge and jury as she tells him an urgent tale of secrets, of lies, of a horrible crime and a conspiracy that implicates his own father. Goodreads

So what have you found to read this week?