NEW RELEASE
The Seven Year Bitch - Jennifer Belle (2010)
According to Joy, Izzy's newly separated best friend, being married for seven years turns you into a nagging bitch. Izzy, who has just reached that milestone, has a one-year-old son Duncan and is feeling resentful that her husband Russell, a book publisher, doesn't contribute more. She's recently been laid off as a hedge fund manager but still goes ahead and appoints a nanny, Shasthi from Guyana. She later becomes caught up with helping her nanny fall pregnant in between judging competition essays. Your interest in and sympathies for Izzy may wax and wane throughout the story. Written like a series of vignettes, I loved the seven-year concept and the insight into lasting less-than-perfect relationships but I just didn't like Izzy at all.
Jennifer Belle is back with her latest novel The Seven Year Bitch, which turns the Seven Year Itch theory on its head. The summary says: "Isolde Brilliant used to have a life she recognised. She was working in finance, she had a devoted, if neurotic, husband, and a perfectly acceptable apartment in downtown Manhattan. But once Izzy's wish to become a mother finally comes true, she is laid off from her job, and her old world falls by the wayside. Although she's surprised with motherhood's hidden pleasures - jaunts to the park, bickering with other mothers, and the sense of accomplishment she feels in having made it through her son's first year - her marriage is on shaky ground and she feels lost. She just can't quite get a grip on what to do now that she has all - or most - of the things she's ever wanted. As Izzy ponders her next move, her best friend announces that she is leaving her husband. Balancing the demands of marriage and motherhood for seven years has made her feel like a nag, a shrew, a ... you-know-what, and she's determined that the only way out is to leave. Izzy tries to avoid a similar fate, but as new challenges and temptations arise for her, she begins to wonder if there might be some inescapable grain of truth in her friend's outlandish theory." The Seven Year Bitch is out in May.