Skip to main content
PBS logo
 
 

Book Review of Isabel's Bed

Isabel's Bed
Isabel's Bed
Author: Elinor Lipman
Genre: Literature & Fiction
Book Type: Paperback
dbs avatar reviewed on + 329 more book reviews
Helpful Score: 1


At forty-two, Harriet just got dumped by her bagel-baking boyfriend of twelve years and she's still a struggling novelist drudging away at a secretarial job. Then she answers an ad in the NYT for a ghost-writer---and is hired by Isobel, a beautiful and free-spirited woman with her own issues---among which is being involved in an adulterous love triangle that ends with one person dead and another committed to a mental institution. Moving out to Isabel's Cape Cod beach house, Harriet starts learning the truth about not only about how people see themselves as opposed to how they are, but her own truths and self-deceptions.

This wasn't a bad book, but about 2/3's the way thru, I was like let's get on with it. One of the blurbs on the book compare Lipman to Jane Austen---I think Miss Austen has the ability to move a story along at a much faster pace and create more charming, interesting characters. I felt like a lot of the characters in this book were boringly self-indulgent. But it wasn't too bad. This is my second Lipman novel I have read---I probably won't read another one.