Product Description

Alice knows she should be happy. After all, she has a handsome husband, a beautiful apartment and membership to all the most exclusive clubs in London. So what if the rumours about her husband and anything in a skirt are becoming harder to ignore? When Joe's job transfers to New York, Alice hopes it might be a fresh start. Especially when they find a beautiful old house in Connecticut to buy. But why is the house such a steal? And why has it been empty for so long? As Alice sets about restoring it she begins to unravel the answers to these questions. And as Joe's late nights at the office start all over again, she's determined not to repeat the mistakes of the woman who once lived there.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1625242 in Books
• Published on: 2002-12-31
• Original language: English
• Binding: Unknown Binding
• 432 pages

From Amazon.co.uk Review
Jane Green's sixth novel has a touch of Pygmalion about it. Alice Chambers, the heroine of Spellbound was known as "wallpaper" at school a "shy, mousy girl" who tended to disappear into the background. As an adult she runs a successful catering company but things remain pretty much the same. That is until Joe Mitchell, a crush from Alice's teenage years, decides to make her his fair lady: "with a diet, a decent hairdresser and a new wardrobe she'd be a whole new woman by the time he'd finished with her"--and, yes, you can grit your teeth at this very un-feminist idea! Joe works hard and earns lots of money, Alice has a lovely house and enviable clothes, and they both live happily ever after.

No of course they don't. Alice soon realises that "Joe is not the knight in shining armour she had once thought", largely due to his serial philandering. When his affair with a coworker is discovered, he is forced by his company to move to New York, and Alice goes too. It is at this point, in their new country home, that Alice is forced to face up to all that is wrong with her life. Feeling "quite happy" is no longer good enough, nor is staying with a man who "loves his wife", but who "is addicted to having affairs". It's time for Alice to pursue her own dreams, no matter how painful the process. Spellbound is an old fashioned story of metamorphosis, but told with the modern economy and wit that is Jane Green's trademark. --Eithne Farry

From Publishers Weekly
In bestselling British novelist Green's sixth novel, a less-than-perfect London marriage disintegrates stateside. Alice loves her husband, the dashing Joe Chambers, even though he works late and travels a lot—he can be so wonderful (when he's around) and she still can't believe he picked mousy little her. (Of course, he transformed her into a blonde-highlighted, Jimmy Choo–sporting sophisticate first.) Blind to Joe's incessant philandering—even after an office sex act gets him banished to New York—Alice accepts his guilt gifts and hopes for the best. She doesn't want to leave her London life, but she's always loved nature and the rustic life, so Joe buys, in addition to a Manhattan apartment, a house in fictional Highfield, Conn. As the prologue warns, it's not just any house; it belonged to (fictional) 1930s writer Rachel Danbury, whose novel The Winding Road blew the lid off the town with its saga of infidelities. "Does history repeat itself?" Of course! Green tracks, in great detail, Joe's further infidelities, Alice's dissatisfactions, their fights and reconciliations; she also dips into the POVs of Josie Mitchell (Joe's lover) and Emily, Alice's best friend. Alice is mostly sympathetic, but for someone who thinks of herself as "a post-feminist child of a feminist," she sure bends over backward to please the snake she married. The one plot twist, involving Emily and her beau, Harry, is sweet but predictable. Green's style relies heavily on exposition, and while her prose is clean, her story is padded—kind of like one of those sexy bras that rat Joe likes.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From AudioFile
Alice Chambers is trapped in a life she doesn't know she hates, with a wealthy but wandering husband, a slightly crazy best friend, and no real self to speak of. When husband Joe is transferred to New York because of an infidelity with a co-worker, Alice is less than thrilled about making the move. The change ultimately transforms her life and those in her circle. Elizabeth Sastre reads the novel as though your best girlfriend is telling the story. She is warm, com-passionate, funny, and decid-edly human in her delivery, making each character quirky and likable, regardless of whether she is reading parts for Alice, Joe, or his mistress. Green fans will love her performance, and those new to Green's work should find these characters endearing. H.L.S. © AudioFile 2005, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine