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A review by jmatkinson1
Queen Bee by Jane Fallon
5.0
When Laura’s marriage breaks down she is forced into a short term rental before buying a new home for her and her daughter. The Close is a private enclave of multi-million pound houses where the men are old and rich and the women younger and plastic, Laura is not exactly welcomed as she lives in what is euphemistically the nanny flat of one house. However Laura finds out a secret about one of her neighbours and tries to help and as she does she rediscovers herself.
I have a real soft spot for Fallon’s writing, even though it sits firmly in a genre that I loathe. There is something altogether more knowing about her work, a very broad sense of sly black humour that runs through each tale and a completely realistic approach to unreal lives. Here she focuses on the super-rich trophy wives and their fantasy lifestyles, looking at what happens when lives built on insecure footings come crashing down. It is a vicarious look into an unreal world but Fallon’s moral streak adds a more sane view.
I have a real soft spot for Fallon’s writing, even though it sits firmly in a genre that I loathe. There is something altogether more knowing about her work, a very broad sense of sly black humour that runs through each tale and a completely realistic approach to unreal lives. Here she focuses on the super-rich trophy wives and their fantasy lifestyles, looking at what happens when lives built on insecure footings come crashing down. It is a vicarious look into an unreal world but Fallon’s moral streak adds a more sane view.