Rating: 
Summary: 5 HANKY READ
Review: They met over sixteen years ago, through a mutual friend, when they were college students. Mattie became pregnant on their first date and she and Jake Hart quickly married. Though over the years Jake cheated, he always returned to her. However, this time is different as Jake decides to move in with his paramour, devastating Mattie and their teenage daughter Kim.Not long after Jake leaves her, Mattie receives even worse news. After struggling with some physical failures, she went to a doctor who informed her that she suffers from Lou Gehrig's disease. Mattie has a short time left to live. Jake, feeling guilty, returns home to care for his ailing spouse and to help his beloved daughter adjust. However, will Mattie and Kim accept his humble return with love or hate as the minutes tick away? THE FIRST TIME is a tissue box plot that honestly explores complex relationship issues. The three prime characters and Mattie's mother are fully developed so that their actions and interrelationships seem genuine. Even Jake's history of cheating and his desertion fits the context of his background so that the audience feels pity rather than loathing towards him. Readers will want a miracle, but to best-selling Joy Fielding's credit, the tale stays true to its course even if it is tearfully sentimental that love heals all wounds. Harriet Klausner
Rating:
Summary: Joy Fielding has long been a favorite...
Review: for her ability to write a suspenseful thriller about everyday people. In "The First Time", Fielding impresses without the need for suspense as she explores a deeply wounded family that draws together, albeit reluctantly, when they face tragedy. All four of the main characters, Mattie & Jake, a couple in crisis, their daughter Kim, and Mattie's mom come shining through the novel in brilliant colors, and find their union in a way that will make this book memorable to the reader, long after you have forgotten the last 10 fiction books you read. Fielding successfully approaches the story from Mattie's, Jake's and Kim's point of view, and pulls no punches in describing the hazardous emotional road faced by today's teenagers and their parents. Fielding had dropped off my reading list in the last couple of years, quite by accident, and I am fortunate to have rediscovered her in this, her best book to date!
Rating:
Summary: Best Book I've Read in Years
Review: I read this book about 5 years ago, but I loved it so much, I always recommend it to everyone. I have since read every book Joy Fielding has written, and have loved them all. Not a romance, and not a mystery, but about human emotions and relationships. Lovely book.
Rating: 
Summary: Not quite a winner, but close....-
Review: THE FIRST TIME by Joy Fielding For those who enjoy a novel full of emotional plot twists, THE FIRST TIME by Joy Fielding is the book of choice. It is a story of a family that is about to be torn apart by infidelity, but brought back together through illness. Mattie Hart is a successful art dealer with the so-called perfect family: she has a successful husband, a darling teenage daughter, and a beautiful home. But this family's foundations are not made of strong stuff. Mattie and Jake married for one reason only: Mattie was pregnant. And although they had fun times together and enjoyed each other's company, they would never have married if it were not for their soon-to-be born daughter, Kim. The book opens with Mattie being angry once again because she's found evidence that Jake is having yet another affair. She is tired of being in a loveless marriage. Her husband Jake eventually moves out, but Mattie's troubles are not over. She finds that she is having some physical problems, namely walking and using her hands. It at first seems to be nothing, but her best friend convinces Mattie to be checked out at the hospital. What Mattie finds out is devastating and if her world wasn't already falling apart because of Jake, this news changes everything. For the most part, I enjoyed reading THE FIRST TIME. There were a few issues I had with the book, mainly finding that I could not feel much sympathy for the main character Mattie. She rubbed me the wrong way, as did her daughter Kim. The story and the writing I was able to enjoy, and if it weren't for that, I would not have finished reading the book. Although I didn't buy into how these characters behaved in some situations in the story, I found Joy Fielding's writing made it more believable for me. I know, however, that if this were a real life story, the story of Mattie and Jake would have been a totally different book with a different ending. I'm giving THE FIRST TIME 3.5 stars.
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