Leaving Sophie Dean

January 23, 2012
In Whitaker’s contrived debut, Adam Dean attempts to leave his dowdy wife, Sophie, and their two young sons for another woman—the haughty Valerie Hughes—but Sophie turns the table on him by moving out and leaving him with the kids. The novel’s title does clever double duty, describing Sophie’s discovery of her post-housewife self and Adam’s unexpected difficulties in the aftermath of trying to leave her. Sophie moves into a small apartment where the kids come after school and every other weekend, and she enrolls in shiatsu classes to blaze a career path. Once a distant father, Adam is thrust into being the primary caretaker, though he eventually finds enjoyment in the daily rituals of child rearing. This is a blow to Valerie, who would rather live an extravagant lifestyle in Boston with her lover as opposed to dealing with screaming kids in the dull suburbs. Unfortunately, the book is full of self-serving characters—even Valerie’s best friend Agatha is a self-righteous backstabber. Whitaker almost redeems herself with the story’s resolution, but a forced writing style and unlikable characters make this a disappointing debut.

February 15, 2012
Your husband's leaving you for another woman? Why not wrong-foot him and get out yourself instead? That's Sophie Dean's move in a lightweight yet abrasive take on modern manners. Although it's architect Adam Dean's adultery that sets Whitaker's debut in motion, this is a story in which predictable female figures predominate: best friends; professional vixens; innocent wives; co-conspirators in the battle of the sexes. When sophisticated, calculating Valerie Hughes, originally a colleague of Adam's and now his mistress, forces him to choose between Sophie, his wholesome wife and the mother of his two adorable young children, and her, Adam, whose feelings are obscure, picks Valerie. But Sophie, although devastated, seizes the initiative and moves out of the family home in Boston's suburbs herself, leaving Adam to cope with the kids. That's the one original twist in Whitaker's tale of marital discord, which is populated with characters tending either toward the unappealing or unconvincing and many of whom come with sharp edges. The exception is saintly Sophie, who emerges sadder, wiser and readier to accommodate an updated lifestyle and a husband who has suddenly discovered human and paternal feelings. Whitaker has moments of insight, but her journey from brittle to peaceable lacks consistency or charm until its closing chapters.

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February 1, 2012
Agatha persuades her best friend, Valerie, to give her married lover, Adam, an ultimatum: leave his wife, Sophie, and their two young children, or else. Sophie, however, decides that since Adam has been unfaithful, he should suffer the consequences, so she leaves him to study shiatsu massage in Boston, creating a space for herself and her children. What starts out as a story of women leading calculating, deliberate, somewhat desperate lives turns into a redemption story for both Sophie and Adam. The novel suffers a bit from the lack of a central character, and frequent shifts in point of view do not always mesh with the episodic pace of the book. Readers who can stomach the characters in the beginning of the book, when they are at their most unlikable, will be rewarded with genuine, satisfying changes, both in Adam, as he adjusts to the life he has chosen, and Sophie, as she adapts to the life she has been forced into. And the kids are sweet. For readers of mommy lit looking for a literary stretch.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2012, American Library Association.)