- Hardcover: 224 pages
- Publisher: Scribner (16 Feb 2004)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0684869403
- ISBN-13: 978-0684869407
- Product Dimensions: 21.6 x 14.7 x 2.8 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 1,821,861 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Plus, get an extra £5 Gift Certificate when you trade in books worth £10 or more before June 30, 2012. Visit the Books Trade-In Store for more details. |
Product details |
More About the Authors
Discover books, learn about writers, and more.
Product Description
Review
Allison PearsonMeg Wolitzer is so smart and funny she should be bottled and sold over the counter. "The Wife" is a complex, compelling portrait of a marriage that raises painful issues, even as it has you howling with recognition. Why does the better half feel she has to protect the lesser half from failure and disappointment? What exactly is the nature of the transaction between men and women -- and who picks up the check? The Wife picks up some of the hard questions with the lightest, most glittering of touches.
Review
'A triumph of tone and observation, The Wife is a blithe, brilliant take on sexual politics and literary vanity...It is the most engaging, funny and satisfying novel the witty Meg Wolitzer has yet written' Lorrie Moore 'An astonishingly dry, funny and gripping account of two writers trapped for life in an ever-more bizarre marriage...persuasive, hilarious and even frightening. The Wife is a milestone in the career of one of her generation's truest novelists' Adam Gopnik 'A rollicking, perfectly pitched triumph...Wolitzer's talent for comedy of manners reaches a heady high' Los Angeles Times 'Deploys a calm, seamless humor...Rage might be the signature emotion of the powerless, but in Wolitzer's hands, rage is also very funny' The New York Times Book Review
--This text refers to the
Paperback
edition.
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
First Sentence
THE MOMENT I decided to leave him, the moment I thought, enough, we were thirty-five thousand feet above the ocean, hurtling forward but giving the illusion of stillness and tranquility. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
THE MOMENT I decided to leave him, the moment I thought, enough, we were thirty-five thousand feet above the ocean, hurtling forward but giving the illusion of stillness and tranquility. Read the first page
Explore More
Concordance
Browse Sample PagesConcordance
Front Cover | Copyright | Excerpt | Back Cover
Suggested Tags from Similar Products(What's this?)Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product)
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Entertaining and easy to read, this is a book to relax with and to enjoy. The blurb compares the author to "a tonic" who should be bottled; I couldn't agree more! I felt that in her company I'd visited a therapist to hammer out some of my hang-ups about life and men; and then gone on to indulge myself further in an evening of gossip with a good friend and a bottle of wine! If this sounds like chick-lit, it isn't - its so much MORE! You won't have to feel guilty about reading Meg Wolitzer, because her book is intelligent and profound. She writes perceptively and humourously, with a delicious enjoyment of language. Highly recommended.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I have never read a book which expresses how I feel as much as this book does. Although I am not married to a famous author, I am a wife to someone who make a decent living for his family and a mum to 2 small children. My life probably seems quite happy from outside, there is nothing really lacking apart from my own career, and what I have (English husband, children, my own home in England) is actually what I wanted in my youth. Then, why do I feel so frustrated?
The book is a honest portrait of marriage and family life, where the wife "makes it happen" and "keeps it togehter". Nobody notices or appreciates much of what we wives do for husbands and children, but we do it anyway, for so little in return.
The plot is very good, keeps you interested, wanting to find out more and more. I am not disappointed by the ending at all, after all that is what we wives do in the end.
The book is a honest portrait of marriage and family life, where the wife "makes it happen" and "keeps it togehter". Nobody notices or appreciates much of what we wives do for husbands and children, but we do it anyway, for so little in return.
The plot is very good, keeps you interested, wanting to find out more and more. I am not disappointed by the ending at all, after all that is what we wives do in the end.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I agree with the previous reviewer that this would work better as a short story (and then it wouldn't matter so much that the end is so utterly predictable). It's a mildly interesting dissection of a long-standing marriage but somehow the sexual politics seem a bit old hat ... there can't be many young women today who would be quite so accommodating of monstrous male egos. In the end, I lost interest in the novel because the Wife had been such a terrible drip! I know it's supposed to be witty and tongue in cheek but for me the humour got weighed down by a heavy dose of Guardian wimmin-ish feminism.
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Were these reviews helpful?
Let us know
Most Recent Customer Reviews
Inspiring writing
What was Meg's publisher DOING, stitching her up with such a stupid cover? This is a STUNNING novel - darkly humourous, yes - but insightful and beautifully written. Read more
Published 10 months ago by Cherry Radford
Honest and engaging
This book is brilliant. It is the story of a woman looking back over her marriage in middle age, the choices and compromises that she made. Read more
Published on 25 April 2007 by Jaybird
Auspicious beginning leads to predictable ending.
This novel's auspicious opening sentence, combined with other readers' hints of a surprise ending, tantalized me into ordering the book. Read more
Published on 8 April 2006 by ****
Great book, bad cover
This is a really fantastic book but is totally let down by the cover. The publishers seem to have tried to make it look like a chick lit book when it's not. Read more
Published on 20 Oct 2004
Customer Discussions
|
This product's forum
Active discussions in related forums
Search Customer Discussions
|
Related forums
|
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
