When Cecilia Fitzpatrick opens a letter that is to be read in the event of her husbands
death, unfortunately her husband is very much alive and what’s in the letter will
entwine the lives of Cecelia and two other women in the St. Angela’s Parish
community. It will send her happily
organized family life into darkest of depths and she could lose everything.
At first I thought this book would be too “slice of life” and domestic for me, but as you read you sort of get pulled into the sinister things in these women’s
everyday lives. If you are looking for a book where characters make all the right choices this is not the book for you. There is
something almost voyeuristic about watching the seams of these women’s life come
apart.
Throughout the book
the POV switches between the three women, however once I was done I had a hard
time figuring out why Moriarty included once characters story because I don’t
think it would have changed the events of the book if it was missing.
Moriarty writes
this super omniscient narrator who has the ability to go back and forth in time
but also give insight into the alternative timelines about what would have
happened had characters made different choices, which is something I don’t think
I’ve seen before.I also enjoyed all the Australia-isms in this book, though I might have missed some things by not understanding Regional Australian culture. – ★★★★
I plucked this book out a free book pile in my aunt’s apartment because I’ve noticed Moriarty just dominating the NYT Bestsellers List and Anne Kingman on the late BOTNS podcast (pour some out) gave a raving recommendation for her twice.
Big Little Lies starts with a murder at an elementary school trivia night and then goes back six months earlier to explore the goings on of parents of the kindergarten class in the fictional beach town of Pirriwee Australia and how this murder came to be. At first I thought this book was just going to be a cozy mystery type murder about the “mommy wars” in the kindergarten class, but it delves into deep and darker material.
I really enjoyed this novel. I didn’t know what I was getting into but I loved the focus on women and their relationships to each other. My favorite of all the mom’s was Madeline, the newly 40-year-old who comes off as confident and brash at first but also has a silly side.
But really this book is all about that reveal of the whodunit and who it got dun to. I read the reveal scene multiple times because so much was going on. ★★★★
I think it’s funny that The Husband’s Secret is blurbed by chick lit author Emily Giffin and Big Little Lies is blurbed by Stephen King. Those two authors are like polar opposites in my mind. Also I think having Stephen King blurb a book as scary on the cover makes it seem like this book has horror elements when it really doesn’t.