Wayne Diffney from the boy band, "The Laddz", lives on Mercy Close in Dublin. He mysteriously disappears a week before the band's big reunion. Jay Parker is producing the reunion show and he contracts Helen to find Wayne urgently. Helen put aside her own personal struggles to try to focus on the mystery of the disappearing "boy band" member. In an effort to try to understand Wayne's state of mind before his disappearance, Helen spends a lot of time in his house on Mercy Close looking through his records and generally trying to determine what was going on with Wayne before he left or was abducted. Having recently lost her own home, she develops an unusual attraction to Wayne's home and starts to feel very comfortable there.
In between searching for Wayne, Helen is spending time with her boyfriend Artie. Unfortunately, things with Artie are also a bit complicated. With three young children that spend a lot of time at his house, there is very little along time for Artie and Helen. In addition, Artie's ex-wife is on very friendly terms with Artie and is constantly there. Although Helen likes her, she could do with seeing a little less of her. The undercurrent to all these problems is Helen's state of mind. She is grappling with depression and it colors her view of everything including her relationship with Artie and her job as a private investigator.
My Thoughts
I have long been a fan of Marian Keyes and especially her Walsh sisters series; I wrote in this post about Marian Keyes's "skillful chicklit". So I was excited to learn that the author was back with a new book and it was about the youngest Walsh sister, Helen. Unfortunately, however, this book just didn't work for me. Helen's hi-jinks all seemed contrived and where I usually find wit in these books, I found that the jokes fell flat. The book also seemed inconsistent - at varying points in the book, Helen's issues with depression would come up but they didn't seem authentic and, at times, I felt she trivialized a very serious condition. There is even a suicide attempt in the book that seems very ill-placed. The author has been very public about her own struggles with depression so I am surprised at the lack of authenticity in the sections of the book dealing with depression. Or maybe this genre is just not conducive to such a serious topic. Either way, I am disappointed that this book didn't wow me as the others have done.
Not everyone felt the same as I did - you can check out other opinions at Chick Lit Central and Novelicious.
I received an e-galley for review via Netgalley
, Keyes introduces us to Claire, the oldest of the five Walsh sisters. Claire thinks she is married to the perfect man until, just hours after the birth of their first child, he announces he is leaving her. Discharged from the maternity ward and carrying all her pregnancy weight (hence the name, Watermelon), Claire seeks refuge with her family in her Dublin childhood home. We are introduced to the Walsh cast of characters including Claire's parents and two of her four sisters and you get a nice taste of what the other books featuring this family will be like but the story is really Claire's. Although Claire's self-deprecating humor makes for a light read, more serious themes are also addressed as Claire faces her decimated self-esteem and discovers the value of being loved for who she really is and not for some ideal she tried to project. This, my first of the Walsh sister books by Marian Keyes, definitely whetted my appetite and I promptly sought out the rest of the Walsh sister novels.
, focuses on Claire's sister, Anna. The book opens with Anna at home in the family's Dublin home recuperating from an unspecified injury. The novel then flashes back to Anna's life as a make-up PR exec in NYC and we learn more and more about her life living single in the city. As the flashbacks progress, we also learn of her courtship and ultimately married life in NYC with her husband, Aidan (he noticeably absent from her bedside in Dublin). It clear something catastrophic has happened but the nature of the incident that caused Anna's injuries and the location of her husband, Aidan are not disclosed to the reader and I was truly surprised when everything began to unfold in the last third of the book. This novel elevates chick lit by focusing on the heavy themes of grief and loss while still maintaining her signature humor and light tone. The juxtaposition of grief and humor could fail terribly but this author works with both themes well and the result is an enjoyable but emotional read.
