Undoing I Do
A Novel
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5.0 • 1 Rating
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- $11.99
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
Tobin hands me a letter.
The words that shred me are: I am no longer in love with you.
The world stops.
Ten years ago, we stood before an altar and looked into each other's eyes.
There was so much we didn't see…
Undoing I Do is a poignant novel about the convergence of love and divorce. Claire McCloud, musician, artist, actress and eccentric free spirit, suddenly finds herself a single mom in the new traditional American family--the divorced couple with two children.
Wild, hilarious, and unconventional, Claire never thought she would meet anyone who could domesticate her. She never imagined a man who could be her partner forever. But then came He Who Wears Scarves in Summer: a handsome German artist named Tobin Kleinherz. It's the 1980s, and he claims Claire's heart and soul at a hip gallery opening. After a whirlwind courtship, Tobin proposes and Claire amazes herself by accepting.
Years later, after a beautiful wedding, two adorable children and countless adventures, Claire and Tobin come face to face with their marital demons. Claire moves from morning sickness to mourning sickness as she realizes her dashing Tobin is leaving, and she must face her future alone. After her marriage unravels, Claire revisits the crucial moments when love and dreams began to shatter and spiral out of control.
With refreshing humor and the hard-won wisdom of a survivor, Claire grapples with lawyers, an empty bank account and myriad jobs to make ends meet. Almost miraculously, she pulls a new life from the wreckage and starts again on the road to happiness. Through a unique structure of interlocking vignettes, Undoing I Do examines the demise of love, uncovering its early symptoms, mysterious connections and powerful conclusions.
This beautiful novel is much more than the anatomy of a divorce. It's the compelling tale of one woman's struggle to transcend a bitter break up, protect her children from the fallout, and live life on her own terms. Using humor and a distinctive lyrical writing style, Anastasia Royal has created a soul-baring story that will have you laughing, crying, and enjoying every beautifully crafted sentence.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The pain involved in a drawn-out divorce is conveyed through a blend of poetry, prose and journal entries in Royal's debut novel. From the very first scene, a dreamy vignette of an intimate moment, it is hard to feel any sympathy for narrator Claire McCloud's ex-husband-to-be, Tobin Kleinherz, as he lights candles (with vanilla-flavored wax) on her bare back. The book's first half jumps around in time, beginning with the day Tobin moves out of the family's suburban Chicago home and then flashing back to Claire's past relationships and the beginning of Claire and Tobin's romance. Twenty-eight days after meeting, they are engaged. The couple lives in Tobin's native Germany for four years, and they have two children before moving back to the States, where the marriage dissolves. Claire punctuates the narrative essentially the long road to an official decree with her quirky thoughts: her "slamDUNK" journal advice to divorc es; a discussion of PAU (perfectly amazing underwear); and the new names she gives local businesses Kinko's becomes Kinky's and the Unicorn Cafe becomes the Hormone Cafe. While the book's fractured style and self-indulgent narration are hard to get into at first, Royal eventually finds an enticing, offbeat rhythm.
