Fay Weldon
Novels
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The Life and Loves of a She-Devil
Pantheon First American Edition, 1984 First published in Great Britain by Hodder and Stoughton, 1983 | ||
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From the book jacket:
The Life and Loves of a She-Devil is Fay Weldon's best, funniest, most compulsively readable novel yet. It takes every mistreated wife's fantasies of revenge on every spoiled, philandering husband, and explodes them into a wild, fast-moving, and outrageously perverse fable of the battle between men and women - and between women and women. Poor Ruth, humble and lumpish good wife and mother, has been doing her best in spite of daily humiliations to please her smug accountant husband, her two unpleasant children, and the assorted dogs, cats, and pet guinea pigs that populate her domestic paradise. But when her handsome Bobbo ditches her for Mary Fisher, a glamorous authoress as blond and dainty as the heroines of the romance novels she sells by the millions. Ruth has had enough. Enough domestic drudgery, enough slavish devotion. She decides to become a "she-devil," a creature without guilt or shame, and go after what she wants. Power. Money. Sex. And especially, revenge on her husband and his mistress. She burns down her delightful suburban home, dumps her children on Mary Fisher, and murders the pet guinea pig. But this is only the beginning of a kinky vendetta in which Ruth, her eyes glinting red, sheds her identity even as she forces everyone else to face theirs. The Life and Loves of a She-Devil is a highly polished and original performance by one of our wittiest and wickedest authors. Bio from the book jacket: Fay Weldon was born in England and raised in New Zealand. She received an M.A. in economics and psychology before turning to the writing of books, film scripts, and plays. Her previous novels include Puffball, Praxis, Female Friends, and Down Among the Women. She lives in London with her family. | ||
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