By: Liane Moriarty
Narrator: Caroline Lee
ASIN: B01GF36EF0
Publisher: Macmillan Audio
Publication Date: 7/26/2016
Format: Audio
My Rating: 2.5 Stars The electrifying new novel from the international bestselling author, Liane Moriarty. Despite their differences, Erika and Clementine have been best friends since they were children. So when Erika needs help, Clementine should be the obvious person to turn to. Or so you'd think. For Clementine, as a mother of a two desperately trying to practise for the audition of a lifetime, the last thing she needs is Erika asking for something, again.
But the barbecue should be the perfect way to forget their problems for a while. Especially when their hosts, Vid and Tiffany, are only too happy to distract them.
Which is how it all spirals out of control...
My Review
More Fizzle, Than Sizzle.
Australian author Liane Moriarty returns following hit bestsellers: The Husband’s Secret (2013) and Big Little Lies (2014)--both 5 Stars; hot enough for HBO series starring Nicole Kidman and Reese Witherspoon—with her latest book of secrets TRULY MADLY GUILTY a novel of friendship, family and lots of drama.
Secrets surround a BBQ cookout. Two old friends from school. Unfortunately, her latest addition, does not compare to the two above mentioned bestselling titles.
From nerve-racking characters via audible, (the narrator, Caroline Lee was good, but has to work with what she has). This one will keep you waiting for the big reveal, for a huge letdown. Kind of like Jane Green’s Falling. There are certain expectations, and readers are disappointed with these type of names.
Meet the two main characters:
Erika and Clementine. Clementine as a child was forced by her mother to befriend poor Erika. Erika’s mom is an eccentric hoarder. Erika is married to Oliver. They have no children. Clementine, is a cellist and married to Sam. They have two daughters, Holly and Ruby. Things may not be so perfect in this family.
Friends since childhood; however, they are not really great friends now as adults. They invite Clementine and Sam over for tea, but somehow turns into a backyard BBQ at the neighbor’s house.
Hence, the big mystery surrounding this event. However, readers will become impatient waiting for the big reveal. No one really wants to talk about "the event", but then there is the big “G” (Guilt).
Erika does not seem to remember, and Clementine does not want to think about it. BBQ hosts Vid and (hot) young wife, Tiffany are of course funny, as well as old Harry neighbor who does not like the noise. (they help the book)
Even though Moriarty interjects her own signature wit and dry humor, mystery, and suspense---it is just not enough of a reveal to sustain the book. Possibly some side or secondary plots working may have helped glue it together. Could have been so much more.
You may be kind of “mad” if you waste a day reading (Boring)…like please, just get to the point before I do go "mad." However, when looking at the author’s name, you have to give it a whirl.
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Advance Praise
Entertainment Weekly’s “Best Beach Bet,” Summer ’16
A USA Today Hot Books for Summer Selection
A Miami Herald Summer Reads Pick
"The author of Big Little Lies doing what she does best: unraveling people's public selves with an urgency that keeps you reading." ―Glamour Magazine
“[A] brilliant story of love, marriage, parenthood and, of course, guilt…It’s wonderfully suspenseful, slyly sentimental, sometimes outright sad―and also truly, madly, amazingly funny.” ―Forth Worth Star-Telegram
About the Author
Liane was born on a beautiful November day in 1966 in Sydney. A few hours after she was born, she smiled directly at her father through the nursery glass window, which is remarkable, seeing as most babies can’t even focus their eyes at that age.
Her first word was ‘glug’. This was faithfully recorded in the baby book kept by her mother. (As the eldest of six children, Liane was the only one to get a baby book so she likes to refer to it often.)
As a child, she loved to read, so much so that school friends would cruelly hide their books when she came to play. She still doesn’t know how to go to sleep at night without first reading a novel for a very long time in a very hot bath.
She can’t remember the first story she ever wrote, but she does remember her first publishing deal. Her father ‘commissioned’ her to write a novel for him and paid her an advance of $1.00. She wrote a three volume epic called, ‘The Mystery of Dead Man’s Island’
After leaving school, Liane began a career in advertising and marketing. She became quite corporate for a while and wore suits and worried a lot about the size of her office. She eventually left her position as marketing manager of a legal publishing company to run her own (not especially successful) business called The Little Ad Agency. After that she worked as (a more successful, thankfully) freelance advertising copywriter, writing everything from websites and TV commercials to the back of the Sultana Bran box.
She also wrote short stories and many first chapters of novels that didn’t go any further. The problem was that she didn’t actually believe that real people had novels published. Then one day she found out that they did, when her younger sister Jaclyn Moriarty called to say that her (brilliant, hilarious, award-winning) novel, Feeling Sorry for Celia was about to be published.
In a fever of sibling rivalry, Liane rushed to the computer and wrote a children’s book called The Animal Olympics, which went on to be enthusiastically rejected by every publisher in Australia.
She calmed down and enrolled in a Masters degree at Macquarie University in Sydney. As part of that degree, she wrote her first novel, Three Wishes. It was accepted by the lovely people at Pan Macmillan and went on to be published around the world. (Her latest books are published by the equally lovely people at Penguin in both the US and the UK)
Since then she has written two more novels for adults, as well as a series of books for children.
Liane is now a full-time author. She lives in Sydney with her husband, her new baby daughter Anna, and her son George, who likes to sit on her lap while she works, helpfully smashing his fist against the keyboard and suggesting that she might prefer to be watching the Wiggles instead.
Once upon a time she went heli-skiing and skydiving* and scuba diving. These days she goes to the park and ‘Gymbaroo’ and sings ‘I’m a Little Cuckoo Clock’ at swimming lessons. She has discovered that the adrenaline burst you experience from jumping out of a plane is remarkably similar to the one you get when your toddler makes a run for it in a busy car park. Read More
