Between Husbands and Friends: A Novel - Softcover

Thayer, Nancy

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0312974221 ISBN 13: 9780312974220

Publisher: St. Martin's Paperbacks, 2001

Synopsis

Lucy met Kate when they were both young wives and mothers. In the years since, the two women and their husbands and children have become inseparable, spending every August together in a house on Nantucket. Lucy and Kate, each other's most trusted confidantes, have shared their secrets, from the mundane to the shocking--but there's one explosive secret that Lucy has kept to herself.

As August once again approaches, Lucy must confront the truth she has kept hidden all these years. Now, in the midst of an unexpected family crisis, she must make a decision that could shatter all of their lives.

A poignant and gripping novel about friendship, family, loyalty and deceit, Between Husbands and Friends will hold you spellbound as it lays bare the desire and complexity of the human heart.

About this title

From Kirkus Reviews:

From the author of An Act of Love (1997), among others: a clear-eyed look at a friendship between two couples that almost implodes when a child becomes seriously ill and damaging secrets are revealed. Narrator Lucy West is married to Max and is the mother of 14-year-old Margaret and first-grader Jeremy. The Wests live in a small town, where Max is editor of the local newspaper, and life has mostly been good, but as Lucy begins her story, in June 1998, shes suffering from panic attacks. Shes been offered a job with a prestigious ad agency in nearby Boston, and she fears that Max, who himself suffers from depression, might not be able to cope if she works full-time. As the summer progresses, Lucy finds she has to deal with even more disturbing problems, these detailed in chapters alternating with her recollections of the recent past. Lucy and Max are close friends with Kate and Chip Cunningham, parents of Matthew and Abby. The two women share confidences, their children are pals, the couples socialize and vacation together on Nantucket. As in all friendships, though, there are the inevitable moments of envy and competition. Lucys memories of the early years of the West/Cunningham bond reveal one especially fraught period. Lucy had a stillborn baby, and grieving Max ignored his wife, who found it hard to be friends with Kate when she gave birth to Abby shortly thereafter. A brief affair with Chip revitalized Lucy and her marriage; soon after, she was pregnant with Jeremy. But when Jeremy is diagnosed in August 1998 with cystic fibrosis, a genetically caused disease, and the doctor suggests Max be tested, Lucy has to admit that Chip could also be the father. Will her confession end not just her friendship with Kate but her marriage? Can love and loyalty endure . . . even barely? Plot-driven, yes, but theres more than enough compensation in Thayer's insights into the tangled webs woven by friendship. (Literary Guild alternate selection) -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.

From Publishers Weekly:

Two Massachusetts families live out a decade of births, deaths, secrets and infidelities in this moving 12th novel from Thayer (An Act of Love). Narrator Lucy West, 37, is a self-employed mother of two; her husband, Max, edits the local newspaper in Sussex, a Boston suburb. Suave, irreverent Kate Cunningham and her husband, Chip, an attorney, move to Sussex in 1987; Kate and Lucy meet at their children's preschool and become fast friends. Soon the couples summer together on Nantucket, and their lives grow ever more entwined. Thayer's narrative jumps back and forth between the couples' present and their shared past. One set of chapters follows the Wests and the Cunninghams from 1987 to 1991: during these years, Kate chafed in her unfulfilling marriage, Max becomes a depressed workaholic and Lucy, devastated by her stillborn baby, takes comfort in a brief affair with Chip. Other chapters relate the events of 1998, which test Lucy's marriage and friendship all over again. When her son, Jeremy (conceived in 1991), is diagnosed with cystic fibrosis, both couples must confront the chance that Chip, not Max, is Jeremy's real father. Readers prepared for the slow pace of Thayer's plot will appreciate her detailed, realistic records of motherhood, child-rearing and domestic routine in Sussex and Nantucket. The finale, set in Boston's Children's Hospital, will strike some as cathartic and fulfilling, others as pat and predictable. Yet thoughtful chronicles of female friendship (see The Book Borrower, above) always have appeal, and Thayer's twist on the relationship is sure and steady. Literary Guild and Doubleday Book Club alternates. (Sept.)
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: St. Martin's Paperbacks
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0312974221
• ISBN 13: 9780312974220
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 320