Tryin' to Sleep in the Bed You Made
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- £3.49
Publisher Description
Gayle Saunders and Patricia Reid were total opposites who chose each other as best friends when they were children. Through the years they were raised together, as close as sisters. Gayle, the beauty pampered by her working-class parents, believes a man will make her world complete. Pat, the brainy one, is the hand-me-down child whose mystery parentage haunts her. She's determined to finally make a home for herself: in the executive suite at the top of her career. And then there is Marcus Carter, linked to both women from the moment a childhood tragedy bonds them in secrecy. Tryin' to Sleep in the Bed You Made is more than a novel--it's the reading experience that swept the country. You will be drawn into the lives of these honest and believable characters from the first page--and they won't let you go until the last.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In 1989, Gayle Saunders Hilliard is living a nightmare. Her husband, Ramsey, a compulsive gambler, has committed suicide, leaving Gayle, her young daughter and her widowed mother destitute. Pressed to add to her income as a receptionist, Gayle, who is African American, takes a part-time job as a maid at a suburban New York hotel, where she encounters her childhood best friend, Pat Reid, a polished executive for an ad agency. Pat, who was taken in by Gayle's parents and brought up as family after her mother abandoned her, hasn't spoken to Gayle in 10 years--ever since Gayle neglected to pick her up at an abortion clinic because she was tied up with her gambler husband. In flashbacks, we see Gayle's upbringing as the indulged child of older parents, and Pat's need to revise her family history as she becomes a workaholic and claws her way up the hierarchy of Manhattan corporate life. Eventually, the two draw upon their shared past to rebuild their lives. The authors have collaborated seamlessly on this well-paced debut. Their heroines are balanced and clearly drawn, while their plot manages to spring myriad surprises without resorting to obvious gimmickry. In an age when personal responsibility is often abrogated in the name of early childhood emotional trauma, Pat and Gayle are refreshingly honest characters, accepting of their own and each other's shortcomings. Author tour.
