Rating: 
Summary: A psychological novel aboul love, loneliness and betrayal.
Review: "Mapping the Edge" is a disturbing novel about a woman in crisis. Anna is a single parent who is devoted to her six-year-old daughter, but she still feels a deep void in her life. The book centers around Anna's disappearance during a trip to Italy. Anna's friends, Paul and Stella, look after Lily during her mother's absence, but Anna has not returned when she was expected. As the days pass, Anna's friends fear that something has happened to her. Has she been abducted or is she staying away voluntarily for reasons of her own? In a series of chapters that move back and forth in time and place, the author explores Anna's past and the way that it intersects with her present life. Dunant's sensitive dialogue and psychological insights expose Anna's fear and vulnerability. "Mapping the Edge" is an engrossing novel of suspense that shows how modern women struggle to have it all, but must often settle for much less.
Rating:
Summary: A psychological novel aboul love, loneliness and betrayal.
Review: "Mapping the Edge" is a disturbing novel about a woman in crisis. Anna is a single parent who is devoted to her six-year-old daughter, but she still feels a deep void in her life. The book centers around Anna's disappearance during a trip to Italy. Anna's friends, Paul and Stella, look after Lily during her mother's absence, but Anna has not returned when she was expected. As the days pass, Anna's friends fear that something has happened to her. Has she been abducted or is she staying away voluntarily for reasons of her own? In a series of chapters that move back and forth in time and place, the author explores Anna's past and the way that it intersects with her present life. Dunant's sensitive dialogue and psychological insights expose Anna's fear and vulnerability. "Mapping the Edge" is an engrossing novel of suspense that shows how modern women struggle to have it all, but must often settle for much less.
Rating: 
Summary: Fine writer, bad book
Review: After reading 'Mapping the Edge', I think it is apparent that Sarah Dunant is a gifted writer. I believe that I may try to read one of her other books, possibly 'Fatlands', but I could not recommend 'Mapping the Edge' to anyone.It is very possible that I have too much testosterone to understand the character of Anna. I found in the book's first 100 pages that Anna acts in a totally selfish, and to me, unfamiliar, way towards her child and loved ones. At this point, I did not care what happened to her, and I could not resurrect any such feelings as the book continued. I am sure that many people will find this book enjoyable, I, however, was not one of them.
Rating:
Summary: Bedtime readers, beware -- but it's worth it.
Review: Anna Franklin's "strategy for revitalization" involves an impulsive trip to Florence, Italy where she expects to rendezvous with her recently acquired part-time lover. Anna goes missing, and back home in London, those closest to her -- Paul, loyal friend and surrogate father to Anna's daughter Lily, aged six, and Estella, her long-time best friend -- are becoming increasingly anxious, worried -- and puzzled. "Mapping the Edge" is both a suspense story and a study of relationships. As a suspense story, the author borrows a premise used so effectively in some of Hitchcock's films: The innocent caught in the web of the villain's machinations; the dupe ensnared by the duper. On another level, the book explores relationships: between women and men, women and women, men and men, adults and children, the victim and the victimizer. Author Dunant accomplishes all this by filling the reader's plate with a clever device: two scenarios of what might have happened to Anna. In this author's hands, it is done skillfully and entertainingly, and the resolutions are plausible. If you're a bedtime reader, expect a late night when the engaging mixture of a suspenseful plot and intriguing characters seduces you.
Rating:
Summary: Bedtime readers, beware -- but it's worth it.
Review: Anna Franklin's "strategy for revitalization" involves an impulsive trip to Florence, Italy where she expects to rendezvous with her recently acquired part-time lover. Anna goes missing, and back home in London, those closest to her -- Paul, loyal friend and surrogate father to Anna's daughter Lily, aged six, and Estella, her long-time best friend -- are becoming increasingly anxious, worried -- and puzzled. "Mapping the Edge" is both a suspense story and a study of relationships. As a suspense story, the author borrows a premise used so effectively in some of Hitchcock's films: The innocent caught in the web of the villain's machinations; the dupe ensnared by the duper. On another level, the book explores relationships: between women and men, women and women, men and men, adults and children, the victim and the victimizer. Author Dunant accomplishes all this by filling the reader's plate with a clever device: two scenarios of what might have happened to Anna. In this author's hands, it is done skillfully and entertainingly, and the resolutions are plausible. If you're a bedtime reader, expect a late night when the engaging mixture of a suspenseful plot and intriguing characters seduces you.
Rating: 
Summary: A thriller of sorts..
Review: Anna is a single mother who deeply loves her daughter Lily. While she thrives on being a single mother, there is a void in her life, something she feels that she is missing. Anna wants to redefine herself. The story centers around her disappearance during a spontaneous trip to Italy. Her friends wonder why she has left and when or if she will return. They fear for her safety and then in turn wonder if she is staying away voluntarily. The book is a little confusing at times being that it is written from several points of view but it does give us more insight into the characters. Overall, a good read.
Rating: 
Summary: Great Read
Review: Awesome book. A little weird to get use to at first but once you get the hang of the layout you won't put it down. Definitely unique with an ending you won't expect and won't disappoint.
Rating:
Summary: Stunning and beautifully crafted...
Review: Characterized by crisp phrasing and an impressive clarity of description, Dunant has fashioned a story that easily transcends the typical mystery-thriller genre. With a practiced and skillful hand, Dunant steers her readers through the intricacies of familial relationships and affairs of the heart. At the core of it all is Anna, a single mother who adores her daughter, Lily, and has constructed a loving, if unconventional family with the help of close friends. In her almost obsessive love for Lily, the beautiful, independent Anna begins to fear the loss of herself in the constant fascination of the ever-changing Lily. So she takes a short holiday to Italy, there to renew neglected facets of her life in a tryst with a new lover, seeking the assurance that motherhood hasn't robbed her of the stimulation of physical and emotional passion she occasionally craves. Anticipating a short escape into the arms of pleasure, Anna's finely tuned intelligence senses something amiss in her personal Garden of Eden. Her brief but intense affair with the mysterious "Samuel" sends a shiver of uncertainty below the seemingly uncomplicated cloak of pleasure, while Lily remains safely ensconced at home in London with her mother's dearest friend, Estelle, and "surrogate" father, Paul. But pinpricks of anxiety also begin to intrude upon their purposefully domestic facade, segueing into the worst-case scenario when Anna fails to return as planned. For the child's sake, the adults maintain a united front, quietly enduring an increasing sense of impending tragedy. Anna's motherhood is finely rendered, artfully exposed and vulnerable, her character the very essence of rapturous first-time motherhood, the pure joy of watching a child bloom, whose very existence is celebrated by those who surround her. Equally comfortable in her sensual skin, Anna explores the boundaries of a sexual relationship with a natural earthiness that is seductive and imaginative. There is a genuine engagement of intelligence by this author, beyond solving a clever crime, and the reader wants nothing so much as to see this child reunited with this mother, to put that small, but perfect, universe back in balance. Dunant clearly respects the aptitude of her audience, the ability to appreciate the blending of intellectual curiosity and mystery, in a compelling tale of love, betrayal and compassion.
Rating:
Summary: A story that takes you right to the edge.
Review: Dunant is a real pro, subtly using every trick in the book to create a psychological novel of intense suspense, a novel that succeeds beautifully in keeping the reader involved, on edge, and dying to find out, first, what is happening to Anna, and second, what is real. The main character, Anna, resembles many other single women about to turn forty. She is a woman with whom most readers will empathize, even if they find her domestic history to be a bit unusual. As she yearns for love and excitement, reveals her vulnerabilities, and shares her fears, all of which play their part in the mystery that develops during her one week vacation in Italy, Dunant ratchets up the suspense--we can imagine and share Anna's plight because she reflects our own insecurities. The fact that she does not return to her loved ones on time, and is considered missing, coincides with our own worst fears, while the fact that neither we nor Anna are sure about what is real and what is fantasy parallels the neurotic daydreams and nightmares everyone shares. Dunant tantalizes the reader by presenting two parallel explanations for what happens on Anna's vacation. As Anna tells us about her past relationships and the birth of her daughter Lily, now six years old, along with two other, very different relationships which may or may not be occurring in Italy while she is "missing," Dunant provides just enough information to allow the reader to jump to conclusions, often incorrect, about what's going on. At the same time, she increases the suspense by having Anna's friend Estella describe the chilling effects of Anna's absence on Lily and the rest of the household back in England. As the novel races to its conclusion, most readers will probably race along, too, unwilling to take a break till it's finished and the outcome known. It is only after the fact, when we "recollect in tranquility," that the true sense of Dunant's achievement can be appreciated--she has manipulated us like marionettes, and we have loved every minute of it.
Rating:
Summary: Silly Me!
Review: Gosh! I actually thought that she underwent BOTH experiences while in Italy! After reading your thoughts, however, I realize my mistake! Wow. Am totally flabbergasted, now, but at least it explains the horse. I was picking my brain trying to understand how she in one instance left the horse in the gift shop and in the next had it in her suitcase, packed. Hmmm....brilliant author, at any rate. She's "right on" in describing human pathos. I enjoyed all the characters. This book would make a great movie, don't you think?
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