Kiss Mommy Goodbye

Rating:
Summary: JOY has me hooked
Review: Having read See Jane Run - this one lives up to the hype of Joy Fielding. I find her story line compelling and her characters fully thought out and described. her book is a complete page turner!!!!!!!! Buy it - you will not regret it!

Rating:
Summary: What a white-knuckle read!
Review: I don't know where Fielding gets it ~~ but she always manage to get me to keep turning the pages of her books! This one is so suspenseful that it was driving me nuts just to put the book down.

The book starts out with Donna Cressy fighting for the custody of her children. Her ex-husband Victor was painting a different sort of picture of Donna to get custody of the children. Then Fielding writes of the beginning of the marriage and it's downfall. Victor Cressy is the man who twists every single conversation that Donna carries with him into a raging psychological battle till you, the reader, begs for mercy! Donna begins to feel battered down and beaten ~~ not by flying fists but by the mental anguish she was going through. Nothing she did ever pleased the guy. So finally, she decided to end the marriage and the book gets even more interesting ~~ Victor told her that if she ever left him, he'd obliterate her. And he tried his best.

Fielding writes so convincingly of a broken marriage and a woman's fight for survival and fight for belief in herself. She writes so convincingly of Donna's plight when Victor kidnaps the children ~~ her fear and anger and helplessness. This book is every mother's nightmare. It is also every wife's nightmare.

I would not read this book at the beach or in front of the fireplace ~~ I would read it in bed with the covers over my head. This is a fright worse than monsters underneath the bed ~~ it could happen to you if it hasn't! And Fielding takes you right into a nightmarish marriage and its aftermath. She is well-known for her stories and the white-knuckle grip on the sheets, couch or wherever till the last page is turned. She won't fail you in this book!

2-7-03

Rating:
Summary: BookWorm
Review: I have read one other book by this author and I really liked it. However, this with Kiss Mommy Goodbye, I couldn't beven get through the first chapter.

Rating:
Summary: Kiss Mommy Goodbye and be glad you did it!!!!
Review: The first Joy Fielding book I read was Grand Avenue. That was the best book she wrote out of all the ones I've read, and I've read just about all but maybe two. This book started off good. It starts off with Donna Edmunds in court over the battle of her children and divorce from her husband Victor. In the beginning of the book, as she is being displayed as a crazy mother, I feel sorry for her, but then as the writer gets into Donna's memories of her marriage, and all their fights, I start to understand and take Victor's side. She is obnoxious, annoying and an awful wife. He asks her a question about her hair being different(she colors it everytime he says he likes it) and she answers," nothing," to which he will say it looks different and she'll tell him she colored it. He calls her on it, saying she obviously did more than nothing to her hair. If he tells her he likes a certain thing to eat, she won't cook it again or if she does, it's different from the way he likes it. It's like she likes to [upset] him ... but then to everyone else, she wants to be felt sorry for. She makes everything into a fight, all he does is stick up for himself and try to get her to shut up. And she doesn't understand he wants her children away from her? She's not a bad mother but as her kids grow up, they shouldn't be around someone who will turn everything they say into a fight. I feel like putting my hands through the book and throttling her. Her next relationship is with a man who is a pushover. He lets her get away with far too much before he finally lets her have it. She calls Victor a sociopath, she should try tape recording herself and listening to what she sounds like. But then she's so self absorbed, she probably wouldn't get it. The reason she supposedly wanted to get out of the marriage was because she thought Victor was an insensitive jerk, and he always had to be in control. Well, when she leaves him for Mel Segal, her lover, she treats him the same way she complained about Victor treating her. No wonder Victor took the children away. I would too. Aren't we supposed to be feeling sorry for the mother since the title is, "Kiss Mommy Goodbye"? In the end, the children lose their father, it should be called,"Kiss, The Rational Parent, Daddy Goodbye"

Rating:
Summary: SUPERLATIVE AND SUSPENSEFUL...
Review: This is a well written novel of suspense. The plot is expertly crafted and well nuanced, keeping the reader turning the pages. With dialogue that rings true, it makes for a riveting read.

The story revolves around a young woman, Donna Edmunds, who works for an advertising agency. She meets a very handsome man, Victor Cressy, at a company party, and he wines and dines her in dramatic fashion, sweeping her off her feet. Finding him to be a fantastic and attentive lover, as well, he is the man of her dreams. When he proposes two months later, she accepts, thinking that she has died and gone to heaven. What she does not know is that she in on her way to living a hell on earth. You see, Victor Cressy is a sociopath.

At first, the change in Victor and their relationship was imperceptible. It began subtly with a question here, a question there, a suggestion here, a suggestion there. It then escalated to demands that had to be met, assertions of imagined slights, rules that had to be obeyed. Victor separated Donna from her old friends and family, until her isolation was total. It finally culminated in a control so complete that Donna, as a person in her own right, no longer existed. The cycle of extreme and profound psychological abuse had attained its goal. The old Donna was merely a memory, as the new Donna was too afraid to say anything, do anything, or opine on anything. Instead, a Stepford wife with two children had replaced her.

In reality, Donna was a woman on the edge of a nervous breakdown, an enigma to all who would meet her, asserting herself in bizarre ways which were only a cry for help . One day, Donna meets a man who recognizes her profound despair and treats her as a human being. She begins an affair with him, which enables her to reach deep into herself and come to terms with her life and her marriage. She asks Victor for a divorce and custody of the children.

The court scenes for the ensuing divorce and custody action are wonderfully drawn, as they are the setting for explaining the deterioration of the marriage. The points of truths in their respective accounts are told from different perspectives in a three dimensional, well fleshed narrative that is tautly drawn. One gets a very definite sense of the psychological horror of the marriage and the reason for Donna's almost total annihilation of self.

The divorce is granted, but she retains custody of the children. Donna soon finds out that even though she won, she lost, just as Victor had promised. Five months after the divorce, with the visitation arrangements in place, all had been going smoothly. Victor seemed to have adjusted to the situation and, when they met, treated her with civility. One weekend, he picked up the children, as usual, and admonished them to kiss their mother goodbye. It was not until they failed to return as promised, that she realized the import of his admonishment. Victor had merely lulled her into a false sense of complacency. In reality, her nightmare was far from over and was, in fact, just beginning.

Rating:
Summary: A GOOD INTRODUCTION TO A GOOD AUTHOR
Review: This is the first Joy Fielding book I read. It is a taut thriller that will leave deep imprssions upon its readers. The protagonist is a loving mother who would move mountains for her young son, Adam and daughter Sharon. She is married to a cold fish of sociopath who bears a striking resemblance to Philip, a character in "Good Intentions," which was written some ten years after this was penned. Like Philip, this woman's husband distorts everything she says so he can start arguments; he is verbally and mentally cruel and appears to derive evil pleasure in making her feel bad.

In keeping true to his character, the husband kidnaps the children shortly after his estranged wife remarries. The reader travels with her down some very bumpy roads including a car chase and some fast-paced court scenes before her joyous reunion with her children.

Rating:
Summary: Heartrending and thrilling
Review: This was the first 'thriller' I'd ever read, as well as being the first Joy Fielding. What can I say? I couldn't put it down. The main character was enjoyable for being so real, and not being obsessed with being a feminist. The events that occurred were awful, yet amongst all that lay the story of a woman who would do anything for her children and the man who loved her for who she was. A car chase and a court case thrown in to add action, and a very human story, one of a woman's strength, at the core of it.

Rating:
Summary: Good book, but...
Review: This was unique in the plot, but I found it somewhat confusing because it hops around slightly from the past and the present. It starts out in a courtroom where the main character is fighting for custody of her young children from her very odd husband. I am glad I read the book because it does get very suspenseful when her husband, who loses custody vanishes with her children. I just found that, although her husband is mind controlling, the main character seems a tad on the unstable side, too. I just thought she should have seen it coming, but try it, maybe I was having a mind lapse. See what you think.