Spellbound

Chick lit at its best. This was a bit of a stop-start book in that it was lent to me a few months before I actually really read it (I did read the prologue a couple of times though...)
I'm glad I finally got past the prologue as the only other 'chick lit' author I'd read before was Katie Fforde... a writer I've read so much that I ended up knowing quite a few of her foibles (scrambled eggs in every book!)
Jane Green was refreshing, less sickly sweet, more in the way of raw emotions and realism. Spellbound was a page-turner.
Some of the secondary characters were a bit two dimensional. They seemed to be there to serve as a springboard to the next bit of emotional action that Alice was put though.
Not a book I'd read twice, but I'm very glad I show more read it a first time show less

This was my first Jane Green book, and I loved it! It's definitely not appropriate for school-aged students as there is mention of sex, drugs, and drinking, but for adults who love romances, Jane Green is your girl! As cliche as it sounds, Green has a way with words. Her description of characters and settings is marvelous, and I fell in love with Alice, the protagonist, almost immediately. Green's characters are very dynamic- I even felt myself feeling sorry for Alice's no-good cheating husband, Joe.
Essentially, To Have and To Hold is the story of one woman's quest for happiness and her awakening from a dysfunctional marriage. Joe married Alice because he thought she would be easy to mold into the perfect, doting wife. For many years, show more Alice played this role well. When one of Joe's affairs causes the couple to have to move from London to New York, however, Alice begins to find herself again. She chooses to live the couple's quaint country house while Joe spends the weekdays in their New York apartment. Alice stops dying her hair and wearing designer clothes, preferring to weed the garden and take long walks with her dog. When Alice's best friend, Emily, and her boyfriend visit for Christmas, however, Alice shares a kiss with Emily's boyfriend, and Alice's safe little world begins to unravel. Alice must decide to whom her heart truly belongs and whether she is willing to throw away her comfortable life with Joe. Did I mention I loved this book? show less

Alice had a schoolgirl crush on Joe. When she runs into him years later he's still gorgeous, rich, charming. And he's ready to settle down - with Alice! She can hardly believe her luck. And starting with the wedding, she changes every single thing about herself to be what Joe wants.

This was an excellent read; intelligent chick-lit. The characters were real and believable. Even the lying, philandering husband and the women willing to cheat with a married man are portrayed with a degree of sympathy, not as cardboard villains but as flawed humans with problems of their own.

I saw where the story was going pretty early on, but it was still a treat to follow the fates of all of these people and especially Alice's rediscovery of her true show more self. I would eagerly read more by this author. show less

Readable fluff of dream husband molding his wife into his dream trophy. Joe's a serial adulterer. Alice wears blinders. If you can get past the first quarter where the author says the same thing in not different ways seemingly to add enough pages to suit an editor wanting quantity, then the final three quarters is good enough for a made for Oxygen channel movie.

I've always really like everything else I've read by Jane Green. However, this book just left me cold. It seemed like it just went on forever, going over the same things over and over, how lonely Alice was, what a cad, jerk, philanderer Joe was. I thought the book would never end. I just wanted to shout at Alice "wake up! He's cheating, can't you see that!!"

This book was an easy and enjoyable read, but really nothing special. Alice was so lame and such a loser, that you had a hard time feeling bad for her. I like Jane Green, but this was not one of her better books.

#62, 2004

Great book, although I found it to be rather different in tone from her others. Not as light-hearted, not as humorous. A much more serious book, about a woman whose husband is a "serial adulterer." I enjoyed the characters, and the way the story developed. I'd recommend.