Showing results by author "Fay Weldon" in All Categories

In New York Magazine, Rhoda Koenig calls The Life and Loves of a She-Devil, "...a novel of blazingly hot revenge, one that amply illustrates the saying about heaven having no rage like love turned to hate, nor hell a fury like a woman scorned."

As the Season of 1899 comes to an end, the world is poised on the brink of profound, irrevocable change. The Earl of Dilberne is facing serious financial concerns. The ripple effects spread to everyone in the household: Lord Robert, who has gambled unwisely on the stock market and seeks a place in the Cabinet; his unmarried children, Arthur, who keeps a courtesan, and Rosina, who keeps a parrot in her bedroom; Lord Robert's wife Isobel, who orders the affairs of the household in Belgrave Square; and Grace, the lady's maid who orders the life of her mistress.

Esther Wells goes on a diet and the scales fall from her eyes. Depriving themselves of fatty foods, both husband and wife have new perspectives on each other, and the process is one of slow destruction of their marriage. Esther tells in flashback, from the depths of her basement apartment in Earls Court, the history of her marital disaster - in between her consumption of chocolate cake, tinned fruit, sweet sherry and a host of other high-calorie goodies.

Ten high achieving ladies are gathered together in the week between Christmas and the New Year, at the expensive Castle Spa, seeking, through Botox, aromatherapy and general all round pampering, a new beginning to their lives.

Ruth Patchett never thought of herself as particularly devilish. Rather the opposite in fact - simply a tall, not terribly attractive woman living a quiet life as a wife and mother in a respectable suburb. But when she discovers that her husband is having a passionate affair with the lovely romantic novelist Mary Fisher, she is so seized by envy that she becomes truly diabolic. Within weeks she has burnt down the family home, collected the insurance, made love to the local drunk and embarked on a course of destruction and revenge.

In this brilliantly witty, caustic yet compassionate novel, Fay Weldon explores the lives of three friends: Majorie, Grace and Chloe, who met as children during the evacuation of wartime London. Their unusual friendship survives despite shared lovers, turbulent marriages, and clamoring children.

Raised by a mad mother and a half-mad sister, abandoned by her father, Praxis Duveen is a master of the art of survival. Her life, indeed, has been full: two marriages, unsuccessful; a brief but profitable career as a prostitute; a little dabbling in incest; a mercy killing; and an inadvertent reign as both apostle and victim of the women's movement. Buffeted and battered by life, Praxis has survived with energy and humor intact.

England, 1903. Lord Robert and Lady Isobel Dilberne and the entire grand estate, with its hundred rooms, is busy planning for a visit from Edward VII and Queen Alexandra just a few months a way. Preparations are elaborate and exhaustive: the menus and fashions must be just so, and so must James, the new heir and son of Arthur Dilberne and Chicago heiress, Minnie O'Brien. But there are problems. Little James is being reared to Lady Isobel's tastes, not Minnie's. And Mrs. O'Brien is visiting from America and causing trouble.

As 1901 comes to an end, there is much to be grateful for: The Dilberne fortune has been restored, and the grand Dilberne Court, with its 100 rooms, has been saved. Lord Robert's son, Arthur, is happily married to Chicago heiress, Minnie, who is pregnant and trying to come to terms with her new role as lady of the manor, and her charming but controlling mother-in-law, Lady Isobel. As Lord Robert and Lady Isobel get caught up in the preparations for the coronation of Edward VII, they debate the future of their recently orphaned niece, Adela.

Liffey and Richard move from their chic London apartment to a quaint, rose-covered cottage because Liffey insists. Their neighbors, Mabs and Tucker, are delighted when Richard petulantly abandons Liffey to pursue his career in London and they set out with energetic spite to teach their city friend a lesson. Whether Liffey becomes pregnant from that lesson or by Richard remains to be seen, but Mabs believes that the baby in Liffey should rightfully be in her.

This is the story of the Honourable Guinevere Dilberne, daughter of Arnold, 11th Earl of Dilberne, Sandra Sinclair and Rita Boniface. Yes, that's right. Three parents. Or, in fact, four, if you wish to count Sandra's husband Clive. Though he played little part in it. It all begins with a loving couple, their interfering neighbour, a test tube and a turkey baster. These days, anything can happen....

Inspired by a series of instructive letters written by Austen to a novel-writing niece, Letters to Alice is an epistolary novel in which an important modern writer responds to her niece's complaint that Jane Austen is boring and irrelevant. By turns passionate and ironic, "Aunt Fay" makes Alice think - not only about books and literature, but also life and culture.

In Fay Weldon's 1983 classic, The Life and Loves of a She Devil, women fought men for power and won. In 2017 men take the ultimate step to get their power back. Ruth Patchett, the original 'She Devil,' is now 84 and keen to retire. But who can take up her mantle? Enter Ruth's grandson Tyler, a confident 20-something: beautiful, resentful and unemployed. Tyler won't be satisfied until he can transition into the ultimate symbol of power and status. A woman.

The witty, mischievous and supremely artful Fay Weldon announces on the first page of The Hearts and Lives of Men that she has written a love story and give away its ending - happy. It is a love story, though, with all the obstacles, both devilish and divine - a tale of innocence corrupted and selfishness reformed. Helen Lally is 22, the stunning daughter of an impoverished artist whose fame and fortune will soon be made. Woe to her for catching the eye of Clifford Wexford, a 35-year-old art dealer, rapaciously ambitious, eminently eligible and careless of all lives but his town.

Madeleine wants revenge; Madeleine wants to be remembered: Madeleine wants love. Who doesn't? Madeleine is ex-wife and chief persecutor of Jarvis, the architect. Why not? She hates him. Hilary is their daughter, growing fatter and lumpier every day under Madeleine's triumphant care, and witness to the wrongs her mother suffered. For Jarvis has a clean new life with a clean new wife, Lily, and a nice new baby, Jonathan. The furniture is polished and there is orange juice for breakfast. Jarvis is content, or thinks he is, fending off Madeleine's forays as best he can.

When Ruth Pratchett discovers her husband is having a passionate affair with the lovely romantic novelist Mary Fisher, she is so seized by envy she becomes truly diabolic, embarking on a course of destruction which brings those around her their just deserts and herself an amazing reward. This is the fantasy of the wronged woman made real: wild, funny, true.

Respectable wife, unmarried mother, divorcee, femme fatale - these are roles that society demands from Scarlet, Jocelyn, Helen, Susan and Audrey. But things do not slot neatly into pigeon holes, and as the women negotiate around the events in their lives, they discover their real selves.

It’s 2013, and 80-year-old Frances (has-been writer) is sitting on the stairs of No.3 Chalcot Crescent, Primrose Hill, listening to the debt collectors pounding on her front door. From this house she’s witnessed five decades of world history. While she waits for the bailiffs to give up and leave, Frances writes. She writes about the boyfriends she borrowed and the husband she stole from Fay, about her daughters and their children. The problem is that fact and fiction are blurring in Frances’s mind.

Wicked, irreverent, and utterly charming, Leader of the Band introduces a heroine unabashedly devoted to her own desires. Starlady Sandra, discoverer of the planet Athena, television astronomer, and wife to a humorless barrister, runs off with the leader of the band. He is Jack the sax player, so provocative that it's into the bushes and off with her slinky white dress between sets.

Isabel Acre's journey through life has taken her from the Australian outback via the beds and alleys of Fleet Street and she seamier side of Washington high life to a comfortable home in London, a reputation as a serious journalist, and a husband in the new chore-sharing, child-reading mould. Suddenly, however, the past which Isabel had thought safely behind her becomes the sources of actual physical danger. With frightening ease, the worlds of political intrigue and murderous conspiracy intrude into the coziness of her domestic life. Whom can she trust? Man?