Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

When Laura Munson's husband, after 15 years of marriage announces, out of the blue, that he never loved her and wants to leave, she responds with all the calm of Siddhartha. Her "I don't buy it" becomes the overarching theme of the months of emotional spousal abuse that her husband heaps of her and the children. She engages in tortured rationalizations and denial. He stays out all night, stands up her and the children, insults her repeatedly, yet she rationalizes his behavior as a transient crisis. She is convinced that he is not with another woman when he doesn't come home. She takes absolutely no responsibility for the rupture, even though it's clear to the reader that she is a spoiled, materialistic, pampered woman who rationalizes her need for the finer things in life as wishing to be "surrounded by beauty," as if that isn't the wish of us all. When it is clear that they can no longer afford their 20 Montana acres with dream kitchen, 4 gardens, sushi habit, and horse, she makes no attempt for gainful employment to help out with family finances. You see, she is a - WRITER - has always been a WRITER, - yet unpublished after nearly two decades of copious product. Oh, she does toy with the thought that she would contribute by freelancing magazine articles, as if all she would have to do is submit and the depressed publishing industry would reward. What she does do is take a one month vacation with her daughter to Italy. She feels entitled to this even though no money is coming into the household. What is unbelievably bizarre is what that woman doesn't do during this trying time. She is totally incurious about her husband's whereabouts at all times of the night. She never seems to try to get a handle on what the family finances are and how long the savings will last. She gives no thought to what she might do for a living (grad school, perhaps) She does not take an appropriate effort to protect her children from her husband's shenanigans-, the first he stands up her children should have been the last time. She never consults a divorce lawyer, even though the husband is sure that he wants to move out. She has managed to elevate putting up with abuse into some sort of virtue, for this woman is so controlled that she never once raises her voice in the face of his monstrous behavior. The lack of humanity is creepy and what is equally creepy is that is she actually manages to keep her grandiose vision of herself intact and undamaged. What kind of woman would even want a man who was capable of treating his family so dismissively? How did she endure this? Was she packed full of Prozac? My conclusion is that I don't buy it. There are way too many missing pieces to this poorly-written story. She annoyingly addresses the reader directly throughout the book. Beware, at its conclusion, there is a reading list of books on her nightstand. I imagine this to prove to the reader that she is a woman of quality. At least now she can say that she is published.