MARRYING THE MISTRESS
Joanna Trollope
Bloomsbury, £9.99
ISBN 0 7475 4936 2

Review by Jean Currie

This, the latest of Joanna Trollope's contemporary novels, is, in my opinion, the best.

Guy has worked hard all his life, rising up legal ladders to become a Judge, going home to his wife and children without a lapse, without outside interests, until he meets a woman on a train. She changes his life, as he changes hers, but for seven years they meet secretly, no one knowing, no one affected. When Guy announces to his astonished family that he plans to leave his wife of 40 years and marry his mistress, the lives and relationships of all those around are turned upside down.

Shock waves go through the whole family like tremors of an earthquake.

Wife Laura is outraged. She and Guy met at University and she gained a comparable degree but gave up all thought of a career to make the perfect home for him. For 40 years she has devoted the whole of her life to that one aim. She turns to Simon, their elder son, who has always understood and supported her. Carrie, his wife, has put up with her mother-in-law's demands all her married life, but the repercussions of this momentous event are tearing her family apart. Daughters Emma and Rachel and son Jack are each affected in their own ways. They all like Merrion, they are all fond of Guy, but ... Alan, Simon's brother, has always stood back from family affairs, viewing the situation in an unbiased way, giving support whenever and wherever it was needed, but he too must take a more active role.

There are no dramatic events other than Guy's announcement, but every character is changed in some way by this big thing that has happened in Guy's life and the decisions he reaches. The reader is carried along, sympathising with one, getting impatient and frustrated with another, feeling sorry for each in turn.

Writers can learn much from the brilliant portrayal of the very different characters, not only their appearance, speech etc. but their way of thinking, their attitudes and what is important to them because of 'where they are coming from'.

Guy has the dignity, clear thinking and experience of a 60-year-old Judge, and views situations differently from his stay-at-home wife. Merrion, half his age, is an independent, successful career woman who escaped from the narrow life with her mother in Wales. She has no close family, nor has she had any lasting relationship until she met Guy.

Despite her modern life style, that very narrowness is reflected in her attitude. Simon and Carrie, less well off financially, both work and can do without any disruption to their busy lives. Their daughters, Emma and Rachel, busy at school, have little on their minds besides fashion and boys, while teenage Jack is suffering his first love, his first rejection. The individual viewpoints, language, attitudes, concerns, personalities, ways of thinking and viewing the world are just that, individual. No two see this major event and what happens as a result in quite the same way or react in the same way.

Brilliant.