Friday, August 13, 2010

Review: Heart of the Matter by Emily Giffin


Heart of the MatterTessa, a young mother of two, is married to Nick, a surgeon.  From the outside, their life together looks perfect - two beautiful children, lovely house in Wellesley, MA and Nick's successful career.  However, when Nick cares for a local boy injured in an accident and begins to have feelings for the boy's mother, Valerie, the cracks in their marriage begin to become evident. 

Heart of the Matter is told alternately from the perspective of Tessa and Valerie.  Tessa has what appears to be a "perfect life" with her two young children and successful husband but underneath she is struggling with her recent decision to leave work and stay home with her kids.  She tries to settle in to the stay at home lifestyle but finds many of her fellow Moms catty and worries that her husband will become bored or think less of her now that she does not have a career.  Valerie, on the other hand, is a single mother with a young son. Valerie is an attorney and works long hours to provide for herself and her son, Charlie.  There is little else in her life and she seems to be a bit of an outsider in the upscale Wellesley neighborhood.  When an accident during a sleepover leaves Charlie with serious burns and Nick is the surgeon who treats him Tessa and Valerie's lives collide.

Heart of the Matter is essentially a tale of infidelity.  As Nick spends time with Valerie in his treatment of Charlie, he develops feelings for both of them and starts an affair with Valerie.  Tessa can sense something has changed in her relationship with her husband but isn't exactly sure what is going on.  Giffin does a very good job of creating two sympathetic characters in Tess and Valerie - it would have been much easier if one were clearly the villian and the other a saint.  But life is not that simple and I appreciate that the author took this more difficult approach.

Nick, however, is not a sympathetic character.  Perhaps because he has no voice in the novel,  I could not understand his motivation for cheating on his wife and complicating the lives of a single mother and her vulnerable son.  While understanding his backstory would not excuse his transgressions, it would have provided context.  What really bothered me about Nick's affair was his relationship with Charlie - it almost felt as if he was captivated by Charlie and then fell into a relationship with Valerie.  In addition to cheating on his wife, Nick was cheating on his own children with Charlie.  While Charlie was a loveable little boy and deserved the father figure he so desperately wanted, I did feel badly for Nick's own children who saw so little of their Dad due to his busy schedule as a surgeon.  They saw even less of him as Nick spent his precious little free time with Charlie.

Despite my strong "anti-Nick" feelings, I did enjoy this book.  Giffin's storylines have matured along with her and I related to the characters and their struggles. Fans of her earlier novels will enjoy this one (there is even a cameo by a few characters from her other novels) but for those new to Giffin, this is a great start!

12 comments:

  1. I couldn't finish reading this book-- I didn't even get to the infidelity, but I bailed once I realized that was where the book was going.

    I'm glad you were still able to enjoy it, in spite of Nick and his flaws!

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  2. I really enjoyed this book. I admit it was hard reading when I knew where Nick and Valerie were going to start the affair. Not only did he step outside his marriage, he also made an unethical decision. I just wanted to shake him and say "think about what you are doing!". While reading, I thought Giffin would have at least one chapter written in Nick's voice at the end. Like you, I wanted to hear his side and why he decided to begin the affair. All in all it was a great read. I do hope the author brings these characters back in a future novel. I'm curious to know where they are and how they're doing.

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  3. This does sound like much heavier fare than I would expect from Griffin. But I'm bothered by the fact that Griffin has fallen into the trap of making the working mom the woman who is attractive to the man that he will be willing to cheat on his stay at home wife. That seems to play up a stereotype that authors seem to love--stay at home mom live lives that they regret and that they find exceedingly dull. I was one for 12 years and found it extremely fulfilling--and almost never dull!

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  4. Lisa - interestingly, I think Giffin was not really saying that Tessa was unattractive to Nick now that she was stay at home but that Tessa's insecurities about her decision made her question her appeal. It is sad, I think, that the whole decision seems loaded and pits women against each other when they make different decisions!

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  5. i haven't read anything by giffin before, but i think i'll start with one of her lighter books before i head into this one. i'm not a huge fan of infidelity and i'm not too sure if i can stand reading a book with a character like nick as one of the main characters. although i have to admit, i like the way giffin didn't paint either women as a villain.

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  6. This was an excellently written review. Even if I alredy don't like Nick, I still want to read this!

    Nicely done, thank you, and happy to meet you.

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  7. I started listening to this on audio and it just wasn't working for me... I wonder if I would like it better if I just read this one from the actual book.

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  8. I was not a huge fan of this book despite being a huge Giffin fan previously. I didn't really care for Valerie at all, and it just didn't work for me. I thought Giffin's writing was still strong, but I think perhaps I'm just not a fan of mommy fiction. I had wondered if it was me or Giffin who had changed, and I think you've convinced me it's me.

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  9. I've been wanting to read this book and your review has made me want to read it even more. I keep not picking this one up because I'm not one for infidelity in my books and I'm being a big chicken.

    Thanks for the thoughtful review. It was great.

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  10. I too liked how this was written. I liked how neither Tess nor Valerie were the villian. I thought it was a very different approach to infidelity. Great review!

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  11. I read the first part of this book on Read-It-First and it looks good. Thanks for the insightful comments.

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  12. Sometimes I have a hard time with books about infidelity, especially if I don't get why they both want this person.

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