The Affair

Seeing the same timeline from three different perspectives was a great way to truly understand the characters and where they were coming from. They all had their flaws, and you wanted to yell at them multiple times throughout the book ("what are you doing/thinking/saying??"), but it was their depth and your overall empathy for them that makes this such a fast, and ultimately enjoyable, read.

Just finished this book, staying up LATE LATE LATE to reach the end. Couldn't put it down. Fascinating look into the politics/emotions/personal logic of an affair. You get to ride along with the wife, the husband, and the mistress; just when you side with one character, you see another point of view and everything alters. This book will start AMAZING discussions! Perfect for a book group. I couldn't stop thinking about it (and yearning to get back to it) while I was reading it.... and I'm still thinking about it now. BIG recommendation for this book.

I think this book captured the feelings of each of the characters very well. I thought the ending was a little contrived. Without spoiling it, I think the ending could have been a little more developed.

Ms. Freedman offers a fresh perspective on the age-old themes of betrayal and love triangles in this book that I couldn't put down. She paints an intimate portrait of three characters, presenting their needs, hopes, and fears in a way that makes you empathize with each one. I thoroughly enjoyed this three-sided perspective on love, love, love.

Overall a quick and entertaining read. While I like and appreciate the three person perspective it also became a little repetitive. I am still looking forward to reading the sequel though. It was a good story line an I am interested in where the characters are headed in the next book.

I really enjoyed this book. The author presents the story from the perspective of the three main characters, giving the reader a chance to connect emotionally with each one. Just past the halfway point it became a real page-turner, as I simply had to know the outcome!

The idea of writing about an affair from everyone's point of view is a great one BUT the way it was done led me to skip through 2/3rds of the book. The same days are covered and the exact same conversations are repeated and essentially the author just plugged in a few paragraphs to differentiate the point of view. The real trouble was that the point of view didn't change enough to make it interesting or to make the three characters stand out as really separate and distinct. I did want to know how it ended but the climactic scene didn't ring true and I was left wondering why I had bothered. Can't recommend this one.

I absolutely loved this book. I enjoyed the different points of view and think it added a great touch to the story. I would definitely recommend this book to anyone who is interested in marriage related books. It was a quick read and I did not want to put It down.

Interesting approach to the subject of extramarital affairs. It's well written and realistic. I would recommend it to women over the age of 25, especially those who have seen what happens in an "affairi."

I applaud the author for attempting to tackle the subject of infidelity by lending voice to all parties involved, being in this story the wife, the cheating husband, and his mistress. However, I would have liked better to have read a story written in first person as the voice of each said character in order to gain each perspective. Yes, each character's "Book" begins with a blurb written in first person, and yet the bulk of chapters that follow are an account narrated by a third person. Who is this third person that could possibly know intimately all three characters? I could have read just the blurbs and be done with it. Yet, instead, I had to read chapters as though listening to a dull documentary's narration or a perhaps a voiceover for yet another reality TV show.

Having said this, I, too, found much of the writing to be rather repetitive and unimaginative at times. In fact, I did a search on the term "frown" on my Kindle. "Frown" and its derivatives were employed by the author a whopping nineteen times! Yes, I call this repetitive and unimaginative. It takes but only a few seconds to think of some synonyms... pout, sulk, and grimace come to mind. No doubt my own face carried a grimace with each reading of "She frowned" and "He frowned." By the fifteenth or so reading, I started to laugh out loud.

To be fair, there were some well-written dialogue passages between characters. I enjoyed reading the dialogue between the wife and her younger, more hip sister. I also think the dialogue at the end of the book capped off the story well.

A few other details did not ring true to me, though, being certain behaviors or implied motivations for a particular character. For example, there is a scene that takes place between the cheating husband and his male confidante friend. The author wrote that the male confidante "took hold of" the husband's hands when dispensing advice. Men generally do not do such a thing with each other when conversing, even if close friends. However, this is a gesture that women frequently do with someone of either sex.

The plot was far too predictable to me. The book is said to be a novel, and so I kept hoping for some twists to the story to surface, if nothing else to make for a more entertaining read, yet none were incorporated. The ending, though well-written for what it is, is a common outcome at the end of an affair. So, I concluded I had just read a textbook kind of an account, a deconstruction on the subject, only the names were changed perhaps to protect the innocent being the children. And so, yes, the read does offer positive opportunity for critical thinking on the real-life subject of infidelity, and apt questions to aid such dialogue the author provides at the back of the book.

I certainly was not expecting a highbrow literary fiction read, having read the sample pages before purchasing my ebook copy, but I was expecting more than what the book delivers given its many glowing reviews.

Having said this, I've read other novels that delve into the subject of infidelity, but do so in a more engaging manner. Jonathan Tropper's "This Is Where I Leave You" and William Blunt's "A Dangerous Marriage" come to mind. "This Is Where I Leave You" kept me laughing out loud but for the right reasons because the author's writing is full of wit and insight. "A Dangerous Marriage" kept me turning its pages because of the author's prose and plot twists.

All said, "The Affair" by Colette Freedman serves up some insight into the subject of infidelity but in a way I find lacking for a novel, given its writing style and execution. 2.5 stars.

Colette Freedman's "The Affair" is a compelling, hard to put down exploration of infidelity from the wife's, the husband's, and the mistress' perspectives. The character are multi-dimentional and sympathetic, and make it hard to pick sides! Their perspectives highlight the nuances and complexities of all relationships.

I really liked this book and appreciated the aspects of the affair from all parties. I have to disagree with another reviewer, however, and NEVER felt the mistress was justified in any way. Never felt sorry for her in the least.

Affairs are inevitable when you forget where you came from. The beginning of life as two. Friedman tells the whole story - everyone has a part and when played irresponsibly everyone gets hurt. This is and old story with deeper meaning. Be careful what you wish for.

This book is so insightful and rings so true. It chronicles the discovery of an affair from the point of view of the wife, the husband, and the mistress, circling back to review and dissect the brief but life changing moments from each of their markedly different perspectives. The writing is poetic and on point, the situations uncomfortable and honest, the revelations at once frightening and comforting. And I love how each moment is made more meaningful through the repeating. Just a remarkable piece of writing that I couldn't put down. READ THIS!

This book, while a good read is also thought provoking. Colette Freedman's character are fully developed. You care about them, even in the midst of "The affair".She can take you into the mind of each person thereby making you understand their motivation without being preachy or didactic. The pace of her storytelling is pitch perfect. I am totally recommending this book to my book club. I know it will be a wild and wonderful discussion among women of all ages.

This author's prose labors from one cliche to the next. The structure is maddeningly repetitive and the plot runs the gamut of obvious to banal.

Even the sex scenes are boring.

I can't bring myself to finish this piece of junk.

The concept of the book (3 different views on the same topic) was very good and I would have given it 4 stars but to much of the 2nd and 3rd version were a word for word dialogue. If your reading the book, you understand what/where the reference is so no need to repeat. Seemed like a filler for the book.