40 Love
A Novel
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3.5 • 97 Ratings
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
From the author of the sensational bestselling Sophie Kinsella novels and the New York Times bestsellers The Wedding Girl and Sleeping Arrangements, this perceptive comedy 40 Love skewers the shallow rich, displaying a wicked backhand along the way.
Everyone wins this game of literary tennis, a comedy of manners about envy in which Madeleine Wickham skewers the nouveau riche. At their country estate, Patrick Chance and his wife host a weekend tennis party. As four couples gather on the sunny terrace, it seems obvious who among them is succeeding, and who is falling behind. But by the end of the party, nothing will be quite as certain. While the couples' children amuse themselves with pony rides and rehearsals for a play, the adults suffer a series of personal revelations and crises.
Wickham's nonstop action reveals at every turn that matters may not be as they seem, and in the end one thing is crystal clear: the weekend is about anything but tennis.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this bitingly funny novel from Wickham (aka Sophie Kinsella), four social-climbing British couples gather for a "friendly" weekend of tennis, but find their friendships tested by competitive ness, scandals, secrets, and betrayals. Narrator Katherine Kellgren gives a mas terful performance, creating distinctive character voices and alternating effort lessly among oily salesman Patrick, smugly pom pous Charles, sarcastic Caroline, fluttery Valerie, a German nanny, two very different little girls, and the rest of Wick ham's colorful cast. Kellgren's narration is marvelous, inhabiting various characters' states of mind, shifting among anxiety, fury, and guilt as the book's POV changes. A delightful performance not to be missed. A Thomas Dunne hardcover.
