Synopsis
When Alexandra returns from her stint on the London stage as Ibsen's sweet and timid wife Nora to find her real husband mysteriously dead of a heart attack and her female friends ominously invested in smoothing out all the complications of the tragedy, she begins to be suspicious. At first she attributes this to grief, and then to paranoia - perhaps she's simply going crazy? - but the smug managerial tactics of solid Abbie, the fussy, invasive ministrations of the aging but still glamorous Vilna, and the vacant, mournful stalking of plain, pathetic Jenny Linden weave together into a creepy conspiratorial veil between Alexandra and the truth of her own supposedly picture-perfect marriage. She finds herself starting to crack, crank-calling her friends' psychiatrist, attacking people with kitchen chairs and breaking into their houses, searching furiously for evidence to confirm her husband's rampant adultery and her own worst fears.
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Review
The 21st novel by the "quintessential anti-romance novelist" Fay Weldon, Worst Fears focuses on Alexandra Ludd, a minor actress whose seemingly idyllic life in the West Country in England is turned upside-down when her husband Ned dies of a heart attack. Alexandra learns that not only was her marriage a sham, but that her friends and family are not as loyal as they seemed. When at the funeral her husband's mistress, Jenny, receives more sympathy than Alexandra and even her dog, Diamond, snubs her, Alexandra realizes it is she who has been shallow and vain, and embarks on a journey to discover what really sustains romantic love.
From AudioFile
This ironic quasi-detective story of disquieting revelation reminds one of early Tom Stoppard, though the implications are even darker. The "veddy dry" British wit is as neat as a good martini. But not as dry as narrator Porter makes it. In measured cadences she proceeds with general comprehension of the characters and situations, suffers a few lapses in line readings and generally misses both the humor and the suspense. While a less-balanced approach may have erred in the opposite direction, certainly judicious timing and urgency would have given this deliciously mischievous, urbane novel more of what it requires. Y.R. (c)AudioFile, Portland, Maine
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