The Husband’s Secret

Title: The Husband’s Secret
Author: Liane Moriarty
Source: from publisher for SheReads book club
Rating: ★★★★★
Review Summary: This book is literary without being unapproachable, perhaps because the author created such real characters and used them, plus her impeccable writing,  to make you think introspective thoughts.

Imagine that your husband wrote you a letter, to be opened after his death. Imagine, too, that the letter contains his deepest, darkest secret—something with the potential to destroy not just the life you built together, but the lives of others as well. Imagine, then, that you stumble across that letter while your husband is still very much alive. . . .
Cecilia Fitzpatrick has achieved it all—she’s an incredibly successful businesswoman, a pillar of her small community, and a devoted wife and mother. Her life is as orderly and spotless as her home. But that letter is about to change everything, and not just for her: Rachel and Tess barely know Cecilia—or each other—but they too are about to feel the earth-shattering repercussions of her husband’s secret. (source)

As you might be able to tell from the cover blurb above, Liane Moriarty knows how to write a hook! Although definitely a book I would describe as women’s fiction, this book had a constant tension that made me desperately want to find out what would happen next, something I usually associate with only the best of thrillers. It was awesome! Transitions between characters occurred at faster or slower rates in a way that masterfully guided the pacing of the story all the way through.

Since our story transitions between three characters, I was curious if I could distinguish which character we were with.The book was written in third person, so each character didn’t have a distinct voice. However, Liane Moriarty does such a spectacular job creating detailed personalities for each woman that I still felt they could be uniquely distinguished from one another. I loved that this intense, thriller-level-of-exciting story was built from these believable people and mundane details. Although fortunately I have experienced very few of the events that rock these characters’ worlds, Moriarty made me believe completely in the emotions she described. Her descriptions, a few perfect parallel stories that are told in snippers throughout the book… everything combined to make me feel deeply involved in this story. Her characters’ also have a lot of great insights and realizations about life, love, and relationships that really made me think. So, while I hate to go all gushy over books two days in a row, this another one that if you’re even considering, you should definitely take a chance on.

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