Worst Fears (Weldon, Fay) - Softcover

Weldon, Fay

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0871136821 ISBN 13: 9780871136824

Publisher: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1997

Synopsis

From the hilarious opening to the satisfying final conflagration, Fay Weldon's Worst Fears is a taut, scathing revelation of the nature of marital intimacy. When Alexandra returns from her stint on the London stage to find her 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, then to paranoia. But she soon 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. "A snappy whodunit of the heart....one of Weldon's best novels yet." -- The New York Times Book Review; "With a dash of murder mystery and a wink at Isben's grim tales of ruined marriages, this splendid and spiteful novel shows Fay Weldon to be in as fine form as ever." -- The Philadelphia Inquirer; "A hundred years hence, if people can still read, Weldon's books will likely have the unblunted edge of Jane Austen, an unsentimental Baedeker guide to sexual manners in an ill-mannered age. Fay Weldon breaks taboos like tape at a marathon, and she hasn't stopped running yet." -- Los Angeles Times.

About this title

Review

‘The literary equivalent of a stiff drink, a dip in the Atlantic in January, a pep talk by a midly sadistic coach. A snappy whodunnit of the heart.’
New York Times

‘It is unputdownable. I cannot remember a heroine tripping over quite so many banana skins in such a short space of time. Her every tumble is a delight. But it is a terrific read and, for those of a misanthropic bent, a primer in human callousness and perfidy.’
Sunday Telegraph

From the Back Cover

Alexandra Ludd is an actress, playing Nora in Ibsen’s 'A Doll’s House'. In the eyes of the world she has everything a woman could want: husband, home, child, income, good looks, good friends, the plaudits of the crowd and the affection of neighbours. But Alexandra inspires envy as well as love: she was unwise to forget it: she was complacent, perhaps a little vain – and all fate has to do to bring her down is to snip a single strand ...

'Worst Fears' is the story of how bereavement can turn love hollow and truth destroys a past. It is a headlong, headstrong tale of anger and forgiveness, of worst fears realised but, in the end, best wishes granted.

Edition details

• Publisher: Atlantic Monthly Press
• Publication date: 1997
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0871136821
• ISBN 13: 9780871136824
• Binding: Paperback
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 208