Kaethe

I hope I've learned my lesson: don't start a Moriarty book unless I have plenty of time to finish it, because I can not put it down to go to sleep. Knowing I have to get up and go to work the next morning is not nearly sufficient to stop me reading just one more chapter, again and again until it 's all done.

The only bad thing I can say about it is that she focuses on white urban professionals. Yeah, that's attractive to many readers, 'm sure. And she is fabulous at depicting family life in a way that's realistic and not sentimental or smarmy. She can make a minor school event into high drama and a successful Tupperware saleswoman into a canny titan of industry.

And also, I suspect that these are all books I'm going to enjoy rereading, but it isn't as if characterization or setting or tone are sacrificed in favor of narrative drive. The plot zips along because the reader has become emotionally invested in these people, all of them.

Library copy.

Edited later the same evening to add:

Okay, I figured out one thing Moriarty does that makes her so appealing. She respects the work that women do. All of it. Not just the creative or professional careers, but also the glamour -free jobs, the volunteer work of PTAs, the emotional work of looking after family, the shitwork of buying groceries, and planning meals. All of it. That's so rare. Even the assholes who are instigating Mommy Wars don't really respect all of it: regardless of their agenda, they only respect the work of privileged women, whether it's as a CEO or as the stay-at-home mom fixing organic Vento boxes with loving notes. President of a tech start-up good, president of the PTA is just a joke usually. Women in Moriarty 's world can be wrong, prejudiced, or thoughtless, but they are all respected.