Meet Lalla Rook. Lalla has a lot on her plate: She needs to guarantee her husband makes partner, secure her dream house in Hampstead, and get her daughter into a prestigious prep school. And on the afternoon she stabs a stranger seven times after he breaks into her living room, she has a four-year-old’s birthday party to host.
With an unambitious partner, two demanding children, and a barely adequate large house in a nice (if not quite fashionable) part of town, Lalla’s life isn’t quite perfect yet. And she can’t pretend she hasn’t missed the adrenaline rush that comes with transgressing. Besides, as a wife and mother, she’s already an expert multi-tasker. So, disposing of a body, framing a friend, and being the world’s best mother can easily be managed alongside the usual domestic minutiae.
It’s just that her husband Stephen seems distracted, her daughter’s drowning of the class hamster is affecting her academic future, and then there is the unexpected intruder. Who is this man and what does he want from her? Because Lalla has a past she’d rather keep hidden—and the sudden appearance of the police means that avoiding them will be yet another task to cross off her to-do list.
Funny, calculating, hyper-competent, and ambitious, Lalla is your next favorite anti-heroine. Just don’t mention it to her mother-in-law.
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This is a great fun read with a protagonist who will stop at nothing to maintain the perfect facade of her life and the ensure the pathway to her future life poses no obstacles.
You cannot but help like Lalla - afterall, if we are honest, we all have a little of the sociopath in us. Author Oliver provides the reader with a quirky and irreverant look at life in suburbia - at bit like "Desperate Housewives" meets "Housewives Of ...." meets "Stepford Wives". The short snappy chapters keep the narrative flowing like a well-oiled machine. And love the "to do" lists at the end of each chapter.
This tome does not take itself too seriously - and neither should the reader. Lalla aspires to what we all want in life - happy family, comfortable lifestyle, good friends, good job with promotion, good schools for the kids - she just has a slightly different way of achieving it - and being the sociopath that she is, will let nothing get in her way and stop her from getting it - not family, not friends, and certainly not a little murder or two or three!.
As Lalla muses ... "... the past will come back to haunt you if you don't smother it with a pillow ..." - and her most assuredly does! Will she let that get in the way of her ambitions - certainly not! Though at times we do worry that she may not have the full control over events that she thinks she has ..... but this is Lalla, our narrator, our BFF, our anti-heroine. Of course she will triumph!
Oh, and to those "reviewers" who didn't like the book because it "... was down to a male author putting on a female narrative voice... " - get over yourselves you nufties! Are you implying men are not ever permitted to write female characters - and vice versa. If so, where would we be without some of the great literary pieces we have today. I would take their reviews with a pinch of salt or better yet, ignore completely.
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