Lover

January 23, 2017
A woman searches for her true self amid the wreckage of a crumbling marriage and the hollow successes of a burgeoning career in British writer Raverat’s beautiful, fast-paced U.S. debut. Kate Pedley is blindsided when she finds emails written by her husband, Adam, to another woman. She probes their recent past, uncovering secrets she cannot ignore, lies she cannot forgive, and mistakes—on both sides—that she cannot undo. Kate’s career as an executive at a hotel chain becomes a refuge from everything, including her young daughters, who struggle to navigate their new normal. But even Kate’s job is treacherous. As a corporate power game escalates, Kate must stop being a bystander in her own life and decide if she’s the type of person who mends what is broken or makes something new. Raverat’s prose is lyrical and to-the-point, punctuating Kate’s transformation with vivid memories, wisdom from friends, and revelations from unexpected sources. To leave the place where “being seen in despair more painful than the despair itself,” to reach the “outer reaches of love,” Kate strives to find the self she has walled away beneath habit and complacency. Raverat’s portrayal of Kate’s “excavation, unswerving,” into the forgotten, unsung corners of independence is a realistic and moving tale of finding oneself in the tatters of romantic and professional strife.

January 1, 2017
In her American debut, English novelist Raverat describes the ordeal of a woman who learns her husband of 10 years has been unfaithful after she peruses his email.Kate, who lives in London, has two young daughters and a fast-paced career in the hotel business. Devastated by what she discovers (not only on email, but in cellphone records), she seems disinclined to forgive husband Adam, interrogating him about his transgressions, even phoning the two women who figure in his secret life. Eventually Adam moves out, and Kate's parents appear to help mind the girls. Though emotionally depleted and suffering from insomnia, Kate must try to maintain her equilibrium at work in the face of fast-moving events--specifically, the forcing out of the benevolent head of the Palazzio Hotel Corporation by two younger executives who may or may not know what they're doing. The author, a mother of three, has a nice feel for the rhythm and detail of family life, and the scenes with 6-year-old Milla and her two-years-younger sister, Hester, ring true. The insider view of the hospitality industry--the endless chatter about the "Guest Experience" and fostering brand loyalty--is similarly engaging, though this material seems to hover between satire and reality. More problematic is the (over) familiarity of Kate's predicament. What's more, her haranguing of the feckless Adam and her petulant behavior--she literally puts the jewelry he's given her down the drain--make him more sympathetic at times, which was probably not the author's intent. There are amusing moments and passing insights into the unraveling of upper-middle-class marriages. In the end, though, the novel lacks the originality and spark to differentiate it from the many cheating-heart sagas that have preceded it.

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December 1, 2016

Kate and Adam have been married for ten years and have two young daughters. When Kate first finds an email between her husband and another woman, where he is referred to as Prince Charming, she thinks it could be an innocent correspondence between coworkers. But when she starts to dig deeper she finds 84 more questionable exchanges between the two. This evidence is all she needs to take a closer look at her life. While her career as a senior executive at a hotel chain is all about the guest experience and making visitors feel right at home in their hotels, she ironically is beginning to feel like a stranger in her own home. With her husband now living elsewhere, Kate must find a way to pick up the pieces of her life and juggle single motherhood, a career, and hiding her self-help titles from the cute cashier at her favorite bookstore. VERDICT For such a heartbreaking narrative, Raverat's (Signs of Life) fast-paced novel pulls readers along with self-deprecating humor as Kate finds her voice. A great choice for book clubs.--Melissa Keegan, Ela Area P.L., Lake Zurich, IL

Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 15, 2017
Kate Pedley swears by self-help books. Whether it's Your Beautiful Baby and ToddlerFood for the Foundation Years or The Secrets to Decluttering, she leans on them as tools to sculpt a perfect life. Now if only there were one titled What to Do When Your Husband Cheats. Increasingly, Adam has been becoming unmoored at work. As a result, Kate has served as ballast for them and their two young girls. But when Kate discovers her husband's infidelity, she is blindsided and understandably struck by profound rage and later, grief. Carrying such emotional baggage would be difficult enough on its own, but in Raverat's debut, Kate must also juggle the responsibilities of a hospitality-executive job which slowly drains her emotionally. The elegantly drawn portrait of a woman who alternates between anger, hope, despair, and acceptance is a familiar one. Rudderless on many counts and coming to terms with her newly rebooted life, Kate is a memorable character, rooted in a story as old as the hills yet still on point today.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)