Why: When I was in high school or college I read The Good Mother. and it kind of stayed with me. It showed that Miller has a way of getting under your skin, which may be why I've avoided her all these years. But when I saw this one at the right price I dove right in.
Miller's prose is so natural and engaging it seems effortless, which of course it cannot be. Jo is a veterinarian, very happily married to a minister and with three adult daughters. She finds herself a bit restless in her newly empty nest and a chance encounter with an old roommate sets her reminiscing about an earlier time in her life, and its secrets and she starts wondering what could be different, sending a wrecking ball through her life's placid domesticity. It's hard for me to describe what exactly this book is about, but I found it difficult to put down, mostly due to Miller's prose and characterizations. ( )

Although Jo does imperil her marriage, I never got a true sense of her yearning for her past. Sure she talked about what happened to her and what went before, but that time seems nostalgic not longed for. When she meets up with Eli from the house, she is curious about him and how he’d changed into the person he is now. She yearns for what might have been then, not what actually was then.

I had a feeling that Eli killed Dana from the very beginning. Why else would he be coming into things and what other revelation could shake things off kilter so much? I do see how the admission of temptation can be a relationship wrecker. Daniel was hurt more by her wanting to sleep with Eli than he might have been if she actually had. He said that it took his confession of the murder of her old friend to keep Jo from doing it.

The 3 girls were interesting though. Jo bringing the police into things after Eli’s confession alienated the one daughter that had any remaining closeness to her mother. Eli’s wife is one of the daughter’s most admired professors and after Jo’s revelation, the wife no longer wants to work with the daughter on a special project that counts as two credits for the daughter. It would have been interesting to see how the relationship could have been saved…both relationships actually.

In the end, the police can’t prove Jo’s accusation after Eli denies it saying that she accused him only because he rebuffed her advances (men’s egos can be so fragile they will do anything to protect them). Daniel is hurt for a while & they spend some time apart (he to a conference, she to help her ailing mother). When he picks her up at Logan, they fall back into the rhythm of their lives.

One thing that one of the other daughters said struck me as true; it’s easy for things to be hard. A hard life is sometimes a cop-out because the person didn’t have strength to find happiness. Having a happy life if work sometimes.

Recommended by MIL, it had philosophical qeustions about truth and honesty and justice that made me really sit and think, but as far as an enjoyable read, it was not one of my favorites. This is a book that makes me wish I belonged to a book club because I would love to discuss some of the themes with others and see how differently different people view the same events and choices we make. ( )

This is a book that badly needed editing. A really long set up for a pretty good short story. ( )

This story of a wife and mother suddenly revisiting her past had great moments and held my attention. Still it had long, boring passages.

I found the protagonist annoying and self-indulgent in a way that didn't jibe at all with the way she thought of herself. Further, her inability to see it, even in the end left me unsatisfied.

At points, her descriptions and observations, while interesting and well drawn, dragged on. Her focus on minutia rang untrue to me, her description of her marriage and her husband was so perfect, that it made what followed wholly unbelievable.

In fact, all the male characters in this book, from her husband, to Eli, to the other men in "the house" felt more like a woman's fantasy of what a man is than anyone I've actually known.

Not a bad pick if you're willing to have a quick read, nostalgic for the 60s, and willing to not think too much. ( )