Thursday, June 21, 2007

BOOK: Good Intentions by Joy Fielding

I finished Good Intentions by Joy Fielding last night. I haven't read a good paperback novel in a while and I raced through it, even though I found the men infuriating, which was probably the point. I'm not sure what genre to call this book, it is almost a chick-lit type of book - woman happy in her life, husband is an ass, she eventually wakes up to this fact. The characters were a little predictable, but I still wanted to find out what was going to happen and the plot flew along.

Lynn is getting her life together after her husband had left her and their two children. Renee (rhymes with Beanie) is her lawyer, with her handsome, rich psychiatrist husband. Both are about to have a disturbing summer. Lynn gets a phone call from Marc, the ex-husband of the wife her husband left her for. She finds herself attracted to him which of course could get messy. Renee's manipulative teenage step-daughter is arriving for the summer, as is her suicidal sister. Both women are successful in their careers, and yet put up with domineering, bully husbands. Renee's was especially annoying to me, but I was pretty sure the outcome, so I kept reading.

This was a great, fast read. Nothing too deep; it would be a perfect beach read, and it is set in Florida, so the heat of the sun at the beach would be make you feel you were right there, watching the show.
There was a great Canadian reference to Wayne and Shuster and their famous Julius Caesar skit. We were just talking about that at work last week:" I said, Julie, don't go."