A Reliable Wife

A vivisection of people made of steel, ice, chipped bone and hardened blood, despair and dreams of something different, seeking retribution or forgiveness or peace. Pristine, vivid, erotic, told in motions stretched wide and tight over time.

I enjoyed the author's style of writing but didn't love the story line.

Very adult themed novel. I do not recommend this for anyone under the age of 21


Catherine is the worst sort of woman out there. But she markets herself as a reliable woman who would make a good wife. She answers an ad placed in a paper by Ralph Truitt and soon is on her way across country via train to meet and marry him.
As they settle into their lives together, Catherine begins to learn more about him. She thinks about her plans and the future she is going to have as a rich widow. Ralph soon asks her to go to Chicago and find his son. He wants him to come home. But there is more to the story than Catherine is willing to admit. Off she goes to Chicago, where she resumes the affair she was having with the son. After a while she returns home to Ralph and systematically begins to poison him to death. There comes a point where she can no longer inflict pain upon him, and she is sure that she loves him. She begins to help him heal.
Antonio is furious and wants his father dead. He wants his money and the life that he feels he deserves. Catherine begins to resist him, and refuses to be a part of the plan any longer. She has not told anyone the biggest secret that she is carrying.
It is all going to come down to one final show down, and there can only be one person left standing.

There were some good ideas here (twists that I really didn't see coming), but the writing was terrible. Really not worth my time.

This book could make a decent movie - the contrast between the bleak Midwestern winter scenes vs. the cosmopolitan cities, the deceitfulness, the exhausting emotional roller coaster the characters ride, and lots of sex. But having to actually read almost 300 pages of run-on sentences filled with utterly unrealistic characters was misery.

Page turner. Makes me want to read Wisconsin Death Trap, too.

Great mystery with a gothic feel. Lots of twists and turns that left me guessing what would happen next.