Other People's Houses

February 26, 2018
A spin-off of The Garden of Small Beginnings, Waxman’s fun sophomore novel stars consummate mom Frances Bloom, her family, and her neighbors—a “gaggle of middle-class white people”—and all of the comedy, drama, and quotidian details that make up their lives. Frances runs the carpool for her children and those of the Porter, Horton, and Carter-Gillespie families on her block, and is generally able to take everything in stride. But she’s knocked off her game when she enters the home of her neighbor, Anne Porter, to retrieve some forgotten craft supplies for Anne’s daughter, Kate, and discovers Anne on the floor with a man who is not her husband. The fallout provides the main dramatic push, but other threads include just where Bill Horton’s wife, Julie, has gone and whether Iris Carter will convince her wife, Sara Gillespie, to have another child. While Frances has her concerns, such as dealing with her 14-year-old daughter, Ava,
she largely provides the story’s humor. Hilarious ruminations about child-rearing, shopping, and other parents give this broad appeal that should extend beyond fans of Waxman’s first novel.