Rating: 
Summary: Coming into her own
Review: Francesca has always been the perfect mother and corporate wife, deferring to the males in her family in all things. Imagine her shock and surprise, when she discovers that her husband Mark is having an affair with a woman in his office. This book chronicles the various stages her emotions go through as a result of the affair--sadness, anger, and depression--before she decides that it's time to get on with her life. Scanlon's characters are wonderful--the selfish husband, the triumphant mistress, the concerned sons, the interfering mother--and the situations are funny without being over the top. She shows various incidents from different points of view which make them even more interesting. The transformation of the mousy Francesca to a woman of substance will have readers cheering.
Rating:
Summary: Coming into her own
Review: Francesca has always been the perfect mother and corporate wife, deferring to the males in her family in all things. Imagine her shock and surprise, when she discovers that her husband Mark is having an affair with a woman in his office. This book chronicles the various stages her emotions go through as a result of the affair--sadness, anger, and depression--before she decides that it's time to get on with her life. Scanlon's characters are wonderful--the selfish husband, the triumphant mistress, the concerned sons, the interfering mother--and the situations are funny without being over the top. She shows various incidents from different points of view which make them even more interesting. The transformation of the mousy Francesca to a woman of substance will have readers cheering.
Rating:
Summary: Another great book from a great author
Review: I have to first say that I love Patricia Scanlan. I have been a fan since I first read City Girls a few years ago and I have read everything she has published since then. I love her work and her stories always hook me in immediately. This book was no different.From reading the book jacket, you would think that this is your average, run of the mill, divorce story. Bitterness, fights, heatrbeak and trauma. But its much more than that. I think this story was oddly uplifting. A dependent woman learns to stand on her own two feet. She suffers a terrible tragedy but learns that she make something of herself. This is her chance to become the type of woman she always admired. There is lots of drama and heartbreak along the way, making this an inticing read. I definitly recommend it anyone, not just fans of Maeve Binchy. I think that Patricia Scanlan is in a category all her own!
Rating:
Summary: strong contemporary character study
Review: In London Francesca Kirwan has spent more than half of her forty years contentedly married to Mark. Everything changes when she dropped off her husband at the airport so he can fly to the continent on business. Mark left his cell phone in the car so Francesca parks and enters the terminal to bring it to him. However, she sees Mark kissing a woman. Francesca learns that Mark has been having an affair with Nikki. She kicks Mark out of their house so he blithely moves in with Nikki. At first Francesca expected Mark to beg her to allow him to return, but he never even plea bargains with her. Francesca begins to fall into a deep depression until her two adult sons and her sister try to help her become as an independent woman. A bit of revenge on her spoiled soiled Mark would sweeten her life immensely. On the surface, Francesca's Party is like a zillion similar books starring a middle aged woman whose sheltered life crashes around her, but somehow out of the ruins she turns into super-person. Getting past the simplistic assumption that one is a better person following recovery from a traumatic event, readers will find this novel is quite amusing. The key to the story line is the effortlessly shifting of perspective between several characters (not just the title protagonist) so that the audience understands the same event from the different minds' eyes. This technique carried off quite smoothly shows that Patricia Scanlan is a very talented author whom entertains the sub-genre crowd with a strong contemporary character study. Harriet Klausner
Rating:
Summary: strong contemporary character study
Review: In London Francesca Kirwan has spent more than half of her forty years contentedly married to Mark. Everything changes when she dropped off her husband at the airport so he can fly to the continent on business. Mark left his cell phone in the car so Francesca parks and enters the terminal to bring it to him. However, she sees Mark kissing a woman. Francesca learns that Mark has been having an affair with Nikki. She kicks Mark out of their house so he blithely moves in with Nikki. At first Francesca expected Mark to beg her to allow him to return, but he never even plea bargains with her. Francesca begins to fall into a deep depression until her two adult sons and her sister try to help her become as an independent woman. A bit of revenge on her spoiled soiled Mark would sweeten her life immensely. On the surface, Francesca's Party is like a zillion similar books starring a middle aged woman whose sheltered life crashes around her, but somehow out of the ruins she turns into super-person. Getting past the simplistic assumption that one is a better person following recovery from a traumatic event, readers will find this novel is quite amusing. The key to the story line is the effortlessly shifting of perspective between several characters (not just the title protagonist) so that the audience understands the same event from the different minds' eyes. This technique carried off quite smoothly shows that Patricia Scanlan is a very talented author whom entertains the sub-genre crowd with a strong contemporary character study. Harriet Klausner
Rating: 
Summary: GREAT BOOK
Review: It took me over a week to finish this book. It was a book that I had a hard time with because in a way it was my life. Though I am not a coporate wife, I have been divorced and I have gone through all of the feelings that Francesca went through. By the end of the book, I felt sorry for Mark Kirwan and Nikki Langan. In so many ways they both wanted things they couldn't have. They both wanted to control their relationship. By the end of the book, Mark went back to being himself where he was taking Nikki for granted just as he had Francesca. My suspicion was that Mark never wanted Francesca to find out about his affair with Nikki. I think he wanted to stay married to Francesca and have an affair with Nikki. Having been a single mom, I could empathize with Nikki. I felt bad for when she realized that Mark was never going to the man he wanted to spend the rest of her life with. I kind of felt sorry for Mark when he had to call his dad and ask for a place to stay after Nikki kicked out, but then I realized it was his comeuppance to stay with Gerald because of the way Gerald had been made Francesca's responsibility after Mark's mother died. Now it was his turn to take care of Gerald. It was great that Francesca got a job, but I had a hard time with her becoming PARTNER with Ken, when it was never stated if she ever went to college or a university. I would like for Patricia Scanlan to a follow-up story and let us know how things worked out for everyone.
Rating:
Summary: GREAT BOOK
Review: It took me over a week to finish this book. It was a book that I had a hard time with because in a way it was my life. Though I am not a coporate wife, I have been divorced and I have gone through all of the feelings that Francesca went through. By the end of the book, I felt sorry for Mark Kirwan and Nikki Langan. In so many ways they both wanted things they couldn't have. They both wanted to control their relationship. By the end of the book, Mark went back to being himself where he was taking Nikki for granted just as he had Francesca. My suspicion was that Mark never wanted Francesca to find out about his affair with Nikki. I think he wanted to stay married to Francesca and have an affair with Nikki. Having been a single mom, I could empathize with Nikki. I felt bad for when she realized that Mark was never going to the man he wanted to spend the rest of her life with. I kind of felt sorry for Mark when he had to call his dad and ask for a place to stay after Nikki kicked out, but then I realized it was his comeuppance to stay with Gerald because of the way Gerald had been made Francesca's responsibility after Mark's mother died. Now it was his turn to take care of Gerald. It was great that Francesca got a job, but I had a hard time with her becoming PARTNER with Ken, when it was never stated if she ever went to college or a university. I would like for Patricia Scanlan to a follow-up story and let us know how things worked out for everyone.
Rating:
Summary: Honest to goodness story-telling
Review: It's a testament to the strength of Patricia Scanlan's writing that her readers, whether male or female, can empathise with her characters. In this tale of a betrayed wife, we meet a real woman: no Jackie Collins-esque maneater, but a real human being, complete with frailties, faults and vulnerablility. Scanlan manages to avoid the obvious trap of creating a cartoonish lothario in Mark and a martyred heroine in Francesca. Even "the other woman" is portrayed with depth and sensitivity. And that's what keeps you reading. You KNOW these people: you work with them, you live with them, you've grown up with them. You quite possibly might BE them. This is old-fashioned story-telling at its best. No pretensions. No clever-cleverness. Something some of Ms. Scanlan's peers might care to note. In an age where there is a worrying return to the boorish objectification of women (check MTV, magazines and many youth-orientated TV dramas if you don't believe me), it is refreshing to presented with such a credible character in a book. Somewhere out there, there MUST be a TV producer who can recognise the excellent mini-series waiting within these pages. And when that is broadcast, perhaps Scanlan's wonderful "Promises, Promises" and "Mirror, Mirror" will be filmed too.
Rating:
Summary: One of the best books I have read in a long time
Review: Well, I picked this up initially because the blurb on the jacket said that it was like Maeve Binchy. Then I read the first few pages and I was hooked. Because of this book, I did not get anything else accomplished all day! I just lost myself in it, and that has not happened in a very long time. If you like Maeve Binchy, you will LOVE Patricia Scanlon. She writes very real, warm characters, and you can even sympathize with the "bad" ones because they are so well developed and have reasons for their actions. She takes a fairly simple story, that of a woman who after 20 years or so of marriage is shocked to the core to discover that her faithful husband is cheating. How she deals with this and grows over the course of the novel is told in a riveting way....she keeps the reader turning pages, and given that this is not a suspense story, she keeps the tension high, so that you just need to know what will happen next. I will be trying to track down her other books now as I guess she is pretty big overseas, but virtually unknown here. I do not recommend authors lightly.....this is a great, warm pageturner....read this book!
Rating:
Summary: One of the best books I have read in a long time
Review: Well, I picked this up initially because the blurb on the jacket said that it was like Maeve Binchy. Then I read the first few pages and I was hooked. Because of this book, I did not get anything else accomplished all day! I just lost myself in it, and that has not happened in a very long time. If you like Maeve Binchy, you will LOVE Patricia Scanlon. She writes very real, warm characters, and you can even sympathize with the "bad" ones because they are so well developed and have reasons for their actions. She takes a fairly simple story, that of a woman who after 20 years or so of marriage is shocked to the core to discover that her faithful husband is cheating. How she deals with this and grows over the course of the novel is told in a riveting way....she keeps the reader turning pages, and given that this is not a suspense story, she keeps the tension high, so that you just need to know what will happen next. I will be trying to track down her other books now as I guess she is pretty big overseas, but virtually unknown here. I do not recommend authors lightly.....this is a great, warm pageturner....read this book!
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