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Friday Nights (Mass Market Paperback)

by Joanna Trollope (Author)

4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)

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Product Details

Mass Market Paperback: 448 pages
Publisher: Seal Books (Dec 29 2009)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1400026040
ISBN-13: 978-1400026043

Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)

Amazon.ca Sales Rank: #369,969 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Product Description

From Publishers Weekly

When a British retiree invites two young single mothers from the neighborhood to her flat, a Friday night tradition begins. As their klatch widens, Trollope's memorable characters do more than just represent varying female predicaments: they develop as rich individuals who come to triumph over their pasts. Paula has a wary relationship with the married man who fathered their son, Toby: she must move on, yet stay in touch for Toby's sake. Struggling Lindsay was widowed before she gave birth, while her sister, Jules, is a careless aspiring nightclub DJ with a wild streak. Independent, put-together Blaise contrasts starkly with her often bedraggled business partner, Karen, who barely manages her role as mother and breadwinner. And then there is Eleanor, the catalyst for the gatherings, a no-nonsense older woman who, though full of wisdom and spunk, keeps her thoughts to herself unless asked. When a new man enters Paula's life, Trollope (Second Honeymoon) masterfully shows how work and romance can tip the scales in female friendships. The result is a careful and compelling examination of one man's insidious effect on a group of female friends, as memorable as it is readable. (May)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Review

"Trollope has a deft touch. . . . This is a beautifully written, thoughtful and enjoyable read."
— National Post

"It may be easy to dismiss Trollope's work as light reading for women, but that would be a mistake…. Friday Nights is a fine addition to Trollope's oeuvre."
— Edmonton Journal

"Don't be too quick to dismiss this skillfully crafted novel as mere 'women's fiction' … men could learn a lot from some earnest perusal of books like these."
— Washington Post

"What differentiates this novel from others of its ilk is Trollope's readable and unpretentious writing style, sparked by quietly revelatory observations of contemporary middle-class life…. What this novel does illuminate, in perceptive and intelligent prose, is the importance Trollope and her characters attach to the complicated business and pleasure that is friendship between women."
— The Globe and Mail

“As subtle as Austen, as sharp as Brontë, Trollope’s brilliant!”
— Mail on Sunday

From the Trade Paperback edition.

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6 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "There are changes now but they won't last, we'll become used to them.", Jun 25 2008

By	Michael Leonard "MikeonAlpha" (Silver Lake, Los Angeles, USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 100 REVIEWER) (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Friday Nights (Hardcover)

In Friday Nights Joanna Trollope mixes in a variety of women's social issues into a contemporary comedy of manners when a group of women meet to share their Friday nights together. Little do these women realize that when a stranger enters their fold that the delicate balance in the form of shared friendships and gentle confidences will eventually become challenged.

Finally retired after years working in the health industry in and around the Fulham area of London, Eleanor has a chance to refect on her life, that has been defined mostly by her work. Although Eleanor doesn't exactly regret the fact that she never married and had children, she's not necessarily prepared to face this consummate gap in her time. Its not until that crucial structure has gone, and that it has taken everyone at work with it, that she suddenly comes to the recognition that there is no domestic life to fall back on. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that she's quite keen to invite two young single mothers, Paula and Leslie over for Friday night drinks, along with pate, French bread, and chocolate.

Soon enough, three other women are attending: Blaise and her business partner Karen, both owners of Workwell, an agency that specializes in persuading organizations to change the way that they work; and Jude, Leslie's younger sister, who loves house music and wants one day to be a popular disc jockey. At the center of the group, Paula has weathered much of life's worries, especially with regard to the well being of her teenage son Toby. Now with a new flat, funded largely by the father of Toby, and her job managing a store specializing in uncompromising dark furniture from Indonesia, Paula is finally at a point where she can finds a measure of security.

Meanwhile, Linsday with "her white knuckle grip on life" tries to rise above her ramshackle childhood. Recently widowed with her son Noah to care for, she envies Paula's extraordinary energy, this life force and this urge that she has to thow herself into things even at the risk of drowning. When Linsday was suddenly widowed a few years ago only Paula was there. Her wayward sister Jules certainly offered no support or consolation and the memories of those hard years constantly make her flinch and cringe.

True to form Karen and Blaise are hard workers and have done their best to make their fledging business a success. Lately however, Karen has become ever more distracted with domestic life, with her two young girls, Poppy and Rose, and her artist husband Lucas who refuses to shoulder many of the financial burdens of the household. Blaise, by contrast, feels herself becoming ever more focused on her career, her different approach and attitude to work pulling her further apart from Karen rather than fusing the two of them together. From the very first page it is established that Blaise has far wider horizons than Karen whose loving family responsibities ultimately are her shackle.

When the author introduces a new character, Paula's new beau, the personal and enigmatic Jackson, this brittle dynamic is subtly altered and although these women would never admit it, there relationships with each other are destined to change. At first, Jackson's affability and charming ways seem an easy fit for the group - he's sympathetic towards Eleanor's hip pains, is even interested in financing Jules's bourgening music career even as he seems to want to make Paula happy by forging a companionable relationship with Toby. Indeed he wants to get to know the rest of the group in an easy and undemanding way that proves to be a powerful combination.

Jackson is a man not obviously encumbered by his personal past, and his curiously imaginative efforts to make himself one of the group are endearing at best. Soon enough, however, his presence is causing these women to question their marriages and their lives, their feelings for themselves, and more importantly for each other. Even as Eleanor sees something opaque about him, something quite puzzling that she can't quite put her finger on, the rest of the women are suddenly beginning to turning against each other, all of them floundering about in a swamp of ill-defined anger and resentment.

Clearly though the women have no choice but to keep soldiering on. Paula remains at the novel's heart, unquestionably enamored of Jackson, mainly because he liberates her from all "the little ropes of anxiety and self-discipline," that has kept the poor and battered Linsday tethered to a life of self-imposed orderliness. Indeed, all of Trollope's women - and men - are constantly battered by life's hopes and dreams, their identities defined by their marriages or their families - or in Eleanor and Blaise's case - their work. Meanwhile, they must all face the hard realisation that sometimes getting out of the situations they have made in life is difficult at best and impossible at worst.

Certainly, the wise and consoling Eleanor remains the den-mother of her brood friends as they move around in a type of dance, some leaving the circle and some returning to it. Continuing with her smartly held observations on the lives, loves, and travails of the British middle class, Trollope's themes of work, marriage, and family - while not unique - add much flavor to this novel. The result is a perfectly stewed brew of contemporary English manners involving a variety of appealing characters that have flung themselves into their particular emotions and into the lives of others, regardless of the inevitable outcomes. Mike Leonard June 2008

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