The Republic of Love - Softcover

Shields, Carol

3.74

2,859 ratings by Goodreads

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1480459860 ISBN 13: 9781480459861

Publisher: Open Road Media, 2013

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The Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Stone Diaries gives us a love story for the ages: the tale of two polar opposites on a rocky road to romance He's a thrice-divorced late-night talk-show host. She's an unmarried folklorist obsessed with mermaids. He lives for the present. She lives in the past. Both are leery of commitment. Neither has ever known lasting love. But when Tom Avery and Fay McLeod meet, it's love-or at least lust-at first sight. And then fate starts to throw them curveballs. Shifting between Tom and Fay's stories-from their complicated histories through their present-day angst-The Republic of Love features delightful secondary characters in the lovers' friends and families, including Fay's seemingly happily married parents and her beloved godmother, Onion. As Tom and Fay forge bravely ahead into a romantic minefield, they make startling discoveries about each other and themselves. With her trademark wit and irony, and a deep compassion for her hero and heroine, Carol Shields gives us a celebration of love in all its guises.

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Review:

‘A novel that’s so engrossing it makes you want to retire to a squashy sofa until you reach the end. Vividly fresh...glittering and spangled with fabulous surprises.’ Sunday Times

From the Back Cover:

"A novel that's so engrossing it makes you want to retire to a squashy sofa until you reach the end. Vividly fresh, glittering and spangled with fabulous surprises."
'Sunday Times'

Fay is a folklorist whose passion for mermaids provides her with a sense of continuity with the past. But is she in danger of using her passions to escape the present, of forsaking spontaneity for security? Tom is the host of a late-night radio show. Married and divorced three times before his fortieth birthday, he nevertheless hopes that next time around he will at last make the right choice.

"A hymn to the pleasures and pains, the raptures even of an unspectacular life. Shields sings with the charm of a true siren. In her hands, we believe, anything can happen."
'Guardian'

"Mythical and modern, ironic and moving, exhilarating and melancholy. A love-surveying love story that is enticingly seductive."
'Times Literary Supplement'

"Perfect fairy-tale material."
'Daily Telegraph'

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