Dirty Diana
A Novel
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3.5 • 2 Ratings
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- $13.99
Publisher Description
A deliciously provocative novel about a woman caught between the comfortable stability of her marriage and her memories of a more sensual past—the first book in a three-part series based on the #1 fiction podcast
“Diana Wood’s quest to reignite her sensual past while navigating the confines of her current marriage is funny and sexy. Dirty Diana is wildly seductive—perfect for anyone who loved The Idea of You.”—Renée Carlino, bestselling author of Before We Were Strangers and This Used to Be Us
Diana Wood has a job she likes and a husband, Oliver, she loves. Together, they have a daughter they adore. She and Oliver spend so much time together that they even carpool to work in the same office. They’re in married love, which isn’t exactly the same as love love, but it’s fine.
Or is it? Is fine good enough?
Diana and Oliver haven’t had sex in months, and their intimacy seems more like a memory than a reality. The cozy trappings of Diana’s life in Dallas, Texas, have become ever-more confining. She is restless, growing more distant from Oliver by the day.
A trip to see an old friend in Santa Fe prompts Diana to remember the woman she used to be: an aspiring artist; someone devoted to creativity, spontaneity, sensuality. In her past—especially with Jasper, the dashing photographer with whom she once had an unforgettable love affair—Diana let herself fantasize, she let her body lead the way. She was wholly . . . alive.
Returning to Dallas, Diana decides to rediscover the deeply feeling woman she once was. She begins interviewing other women, painting their portraits as they speak. She encourages them to give voice to their secret desires as she captures their deepest, innermost fantasies. But is it possible for Diana to reclaim her more sensual self and maintain the marriage she committed to? What if connecting to her own desires means dissolving the safe life she’s so carefully cultivated?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
This entertaining debut novel, which chronicles a woman's midlife crisis, is the first in a trilogy based on the eponymous fiction podcast produced by Besser and Feste and starring Demi Moore. Diana Wood, a 41-year-old lapsed artist, feels disconnected from her husband, Oliver, and wants more than the suburban life they've built in Dallas as parents to a six-year-old girl. She pounces on the opportunity to return to her former home of Santa Fe, N.Mex., where she once worked as an artist's assistant and aspired to a creative career of her own. In Santa Fe, she flashes back to her 25th birthday, when she was still with her long-lost love, a famous photographer and heartbreaker named Jasper. Diana's past couldn't contrast more deeply with her present, and as she returns to a long-abandoned creative project in which she interviews women about their sexual experiences and fantasies, her marriage disintegrates. "Whatever this new path we're on is, it's scary and unsettling, nothing like the warm safety of mediocrity," Diana muses as things with Oliver fall apart. "I miss it, suddenly. Feeling nothing." Chock-full of erotic sex scenes, this raucous romp ends on a tantalizing cliff-hanger. Readers will have a tough time waiting for the next installment. Agents: Anna Worrall and Alia Hanna Habib, Gernert Co.
