Wednesday 4th June, 2014 - The Husbands Secret by Liane Moriarty, chosen by Ant

The Husband's Secret by Liane Moriarty

• An quick and easy read
• Setting - Australia - Sydney and Melbourne
• Written from the viewpoint of three different women
• Theme - "secrets", family, relationships

What we discussed:

• The author, her background, books that she has written and more

• Audio version vs the book - The audio was confusing at times as one was not sure who's voice was speaking - Those who had the book were able to compare the two and it helped put things into perspective.

• Noted was the cover of the book (posted above) with picture of butterfly in the jar waiting to fly out

• The characters - We discussed the characters in great detail. Did we like them? Did we believe their stories? Why did they choose to do what they did?  We did not find all of their stories believable however they did bring out all kinds of feelings from us.

• The secret - The book was terribly addictive.  We desperately needed to find out what the secret was all about. We had all kinds of suspicions and rushed to get to the end!  The big question in our minds, once we found out was that if it had been our secret, would we have kept it to ourselves. We each had opinions to offer and it was very interesting to hear everyone's comments.

Chick Lit vs literary - How do you rate a book?  We all have different ways of rating what we read. Initially, not everyone was happy to read this book as some felt it would be a waste of time. Bookclub introduces us to books that we would not necessarily choose to read and sometimes we have to go with the flow. This was a light read and many of us finished it within the week, having a chance to catch up on other things after. The book generated heavy discussion and also lots of laughter. We went home feeling quite refreshed, relaxed and entertained, looking forward to another month of reading ahead.

Links:

Liane Moriarty's Website

Reading Group Notes (Pan MacMillan)   (Spoiler so only look after reading the book!!!)

Interest in Liane Moriaty's work - Nicole Kidman and Reese Witherspoon  (arrticle by Nick Galvin -  Aug 2014)