Happiness Sold Separately
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4.2 • 22 Ratings
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- $6.99
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- $6.99
Publisher Description
A darkly funny and messy love story about the struggle to live happily ever after after the after, by the New York Times bestselling author of Good Grief. Elinor Mackey has always done the right thing-college, law school, career, marriage-but now everything's gone wrong. In her late thirties, Elinor has discovered that she can't have children; all the doctors can tell her is that it's because of her age. She withdraws from her podiatrist husband, Ted, into an interior world of heartbreak. Her closest companion? The tree in her backyard. But since everything in her life is going from bad to worse, soon, despite the best efforts of the tree doctor, her tree must be cut down.
Ted Mackey has always done the right thing, too. He started going to the gym and lost weight, got on track, got in The Zone. But when he uncharacteristically has an affair with his personal trainer ? who has an odd-ball son who latches on to Ted like a barnacle -- he has to figure out how to make everything right (even if he's not sure what right even means anymore).
In a complicated dance of partners, lovers and admirers, Happiness Sold Seperately delightfully shows that sometimes love with the wrong person is sometimes right.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The marriage of Ted and Elinor Mackey, a yuppie podiatrist-lawyer couple in their early-40s living in Northern California, is pushed to the brink when Elinor learns that Ted is having an affair with his trainer, Gina Ellison. Elinor's reaction pity surprises her. Winston (Good Grief) adroitly makes it clear that Ted's affair is a symptom: infertility problems have caused years of emotional turmoil. And Gina's no bimbo: she has a loving but difficult relationship with Ted, complicated further by her young son, Toby, and his immediate attachment to Ted as a stable father figure. When Elinor confronts Ted and Gina, Ted quickly ends the affair; neither is sure if infidelity or infertility should end their marriage. During their separation, Elinor takes a sabbatical from her law firm and casually dates Noah Orch, a hunky but dull arborist. Ted haphazardly resumes his relationship with Gina. As he realizes that his connection to her is more than an escape from a bad marriage, all concerned have decisions to make. Winston has a real feel for the push and pull of a marriage in crisis, and delivers it in a brisk, funny, no-nonsense style that still comes off as respectful of the material.
Customer Reviews
A lot deeper than it seems
This book might find itself inappropriately niched in the category of chick lit. Nothing bad about chick lit, except I'm not a chick. However this book brings characters with very difficult and real emotions and problems to life in surprising ways. Not at all what I was expecting (a book about separation and infertility) it was about deep convolutions that bear a lot more resemblance to real life than is normally found in a book. Given that there is a ton of humor (black sometimes) and angst I was thoroughly pleased, enough to buy the audio book condensed version as well, although i did not like the condensing process; it takes every word to tell this story. The end, like the title promises, does not wrap things in a happy Brady bunchesque knot. Of course that would have to be sold separately.