Set in the world of London academia, both past and present, Wife by Charlotte Mendelson is heart-breaking and funny, profound and gripping, as it takes the reader from the end of a relationship to its beginning, and back again.
When Zoe moves in with Penny, their relationship looks perfect; after all, everyone wants a wife. But this is the story of how love can become a disaster . . .
Zoe Stamper, junior researcher in Ancient Greek Tragedy, meets fellow academic Dr Penny Cartwright at a faculty flute recital. Dr Cartwright seems impossibly glamorous to Zoe, who is, after all, several rungs down the academic pecking order - and a nervous ingénue as far as Penny's sophisticated circle is concerned. But Penny leaves Zoe a cryptic note, and a passionate affair ensues.
Once Penny confesses all to her live-in lover, Justine, their happiness seems assured. But there is something else Penny needs as badly in her life as Zoe's adoration, and thus the beginning of their affair might also have signalled its end.
Praise for Charlotte Mendelson:
'A master at family drama' – The Times
'One of the funniest writers in Britain' – The Guardian
'Mendelson's novels inhabit similar territory to those of Maggie O'Farrell, with the same capacity for extreme noticing, the same profound emotional intelligence' – The Observer Charlotte Mendelson's previous novel, The Exhibitionist, was longlisted for the Women's Prize for Fiction and was Novel of the Year 2022 in The Times as well as a book of the year in The Guardian and Good Housekeeping. Her other novels include Almost English, which was longlisted for both the Man Booker and the Women's Prize for Fiction; When We Were Bad, which was shortlisted for the Orange Prize for Fiction and was a book of the year in The Observer, The Guardian, The Sunday Times, The New Statesman and The Spectator; Daughters of Jerusalem, which won both the Somerset Maugham Award and the John Llewellyn Rhys Prize; and Love in Idleness. Wife is her sixth novel. A beautifully observed novel by literary star Charlotte Mendelson about the joys of passionate love and those left in its wake when passion curdles, told with Charlotte's signature wit and wisdom.
