Angry Housewives Eating Bon Bons in What's the Name of That Book???

Mar 23, 2012 Kate rated it liked it

Shelves: age-adult, chicklit, 2012, adult-book-club

When Faith moves to Freesia Court in winter of the late 60s, she and residents Audrey, Slip, Kari, and Merit become fast friends. Audrey's the resident sex fiend, Slip is the political rebel, Kari the older mother figure, Faith the mystery, and Merit... I don't know, the victim? They decide to start a book club, and over the years (four decades, to be exact) their friendship helps them through a gamut of issues ranging from pregnancy, infidelity, divorce, homosexuality, domestic abuse, adoption, When Faith moves to Freesia Court in winter of the late 60s, she and residents Audrey, Slip, Kari, and Merit become fast friends. Audrey's the resident sex fiend, Slip is the political rebel, Kari the older mother figure, Faith the mystery, and Merit... I don't know, the victim? They decide to start a book club, and over the years (four decades, to be exact) their friendship helps them through a gamut of issues ranging from pregnancy, infidelity, divorce, homosexuality, domestic abuse, adoption, family secrets, cancer, and PTSD.

Yes, that is a long list of issues. This book was a bit like a free-for-all. You're in the 60s, so you're dealing with a man's world, emerging feminism, Merit's husband beating her. You're in the 70s, so you're dealing with the fallout from Vietnam, war protests, drug use, and divorce. You get the picture. I wanted there to be some unifying thing tying all these things together, but it wasn't Faith's life of lies because she's too ashamed to say that her father disappeared when she was a baby and her mom was an alcoholic, and everything else was too disjointed to really be given the weight it could have been given.

My first major issue with the way this book was written involved the moving from third person to the occasional first person narration (only for Slip and Audrey) and the random letters penned by Faith to her dead mother, which would occasionally appear in these first person chapters. My second major issue was with the structure of the novel, where chapters were headed by the month, year, and book club book selection. At first the chapters were month to month, then suddenly they were jumping years and at one point a newborn baby went to eight years old in a matter of two chapters and I had to flip back to figure out what had happened. The fact that the books the Angry Housewives read had little to nothing to do with the chapters' theme (this is really based only on the one book of theirs that I had read - The Stand by Stephen King) made it nearly pointless. On top of the jump between years from chapter to chapter, it wasn't like the author introduced important changes since the previous chapter right away. You're reading along and slowly realize, Oh, Audrey and her husband are separated now... Oh, this person had her baby three years ago.

Then there are thematic issues... Right off the bat I wanted to punch Merit's asshole husband Eric in the face. Of course Merit stays with him, defying him by doing things like putting dirty tissues and Q-tips in the updo he insists she wear. Eventually she leaves him but I never felt like Merit truly gave him what I might have given him, this bastard who called his own wife a retard and beat her when she was pregnant. Then you have Slip, the fiesty feminist who is so status-quo it really made me wonder what she was fighting "the man" for. She wasn't even the leader in the housewives' rescue of Merit from Eric. And the fact that they continued calling themselves "Angry Housewives Eating Bon-Bons" for four decades after a snide comment Eric made was just sort of sickening. I probably would have made Merit's situation the focus of the struggle, since she seemed to have the most complete story over the decades, but Merit really didn't have much of a personality at all. Nor did Faith, but it was Faith's lies about her mother that appeared to be the connective thread. For me, Audrey was the most interesting character, although by the end she's wallowing in bon-bons and hanging out with her gay friend Grant, who seems a random addition to the book club now that they're all in their early 60s.

And then of course you have the daughter who writes a novel and immediately gets an agent and is published within a chapter. Argh!

All these complaints aside, I did finish the book, and there were some interesting storylines. I was hoping for something more akin to Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood, and this may appeal to some fans of that book. It just wasn't for me. ...more

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Jun 26, 2007 Karol rated it it was ok

This book took me two years to finish because it was hard to get interested. It covers almost any subject that could possibly touch a woman: divorce, spouse abuse, death of spouse, cancer, conflict with best friends, etc. etc. By the end of the book I was glad it was over. Even the friendship of the women in the book was annoying to me. I think the author tried to cram too much into the book.

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Oct 20, 2008 Elizabeth rated it really liked it

I loved this book! Honestly, I think the only thing keeping it from a five-star rating is the occasional rough language ... that's always a drawback for me.

I think that the author has so perfectly portrayed the relationships, and I loved how interwoven the characters became. It was a well-written and quick read, and well worth the time! (Not that it takes much, I started it yesterday!) ...more

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