Fans of Liane Moriarty and Jojo Moyes will be captivated by this riveting family drama with a dark mystery at its core, from the New York Times bestselling author of The House We Grew Up In. In the early hours of a summer morning, a young woman steps into the path of an oncoming bus. A tragic accident? Or suicide? At the center of this puzzle is Adrian Wolfe, a successful architect and … successful architect and grief-stricken widower, who, a year after his third wife’s death, begins to investigate the cause. As Adrian looks back on their brief but seemingly happy marriage, disturbing secrets begin to surface. The divorces from his two previous wives had been amicable, or so it seemed; his children, all five of them, were resilient as ever, or so he thought. But something, or someone, must have pushed Maya over the edge.
“Jewell’s last few novels have been a revelation–emotionally sophisticated and complex,” says Kirkus Reviews. “Like Liane Moriarty, she manages the perfect blend of women’s fiction and nail-biting suspense,” hails Booklist. The Third Wife is “an emotionally intelligent, brilliantly plotted, and beautifully written examination of a very modern family that will keep you gripped to the end” (London Daily Mail).more
The Third Wife is my first book of Jewell’s but it won’t be the last. I love how she can take a story that could be banal in the hands of a lesser writer and make it suspenseful, touching, and complex all at once. I cared so much about the characters that I forgot I was reading a book and felt like I was catching up with distant friends. Super!
It’s an ambitious story — thoroughly exploring the paramount concepts of belonging and forgiveness — building to a series of powerful and satisfying conclusions. Every page is written with grace. Insights abound. I can’t think of another author who so vividly portrays the dynamics of family life.
This is the story of a man who has tragically lost his third wife. He has a large family from two marriages and now wishes to discover the cause of his third wife’s mysterious death. Except for the last part, where some explanation is finally offered for the cause of death, this book was not very satisfying to me.
I really needed to let this one sit for a while before making my mind up. I’m teetering on ‘decent’ and ‘good’ with this review. But I’ve finally decided to say The Third Wife by Lisa Jewell is decent.
Adrian Wolfe has the perfect life. While he may be on his third wife, has five children with two other women and no longer lives in his dream home he built — he is loved, successful and married to his charming third wife, Maya. That is until she tragically dies after a night of drinking and steps off a curb and is killed by an oncoming bus. As Adrian starts to examine what happened leading up to Maya’s death, we start to see the cracks in what appears to be a not so perfect life
While his first two wives and all five children appear to get along swimmingly, they all crave Adrian’s attention as well. Slowly, Adrian starts to realize this craving for attention is a breaking point for some of them to reveal they might not be as resilient to the changes that he forced on them by ending and starting three new lives. As Adrian explores what happened to Maya, more and more of his family’s true feelings for her, the other family members and even for him unfold. Maybe Adrian doesn’t know his family as well as he thought he did? And could one of them even push Maya to the breaking point of killing herself?
Having read a couple of other Lisa Jewell’s books, I knew she was going to bring in some complex characters to deal with — and she certainly delivered on this one! From the ex-wives, the five children and even a detective or two, there were enough characters to try and keep track of! I think that was what brought my review down slightly. There were just too many characters! I became a wee bit overwhelmed with them all and what they had done or not done, what secrets they were hiding, who were with what family. I mean, how many point of view are we going to get in one story?
I will say for the positives, Jewell’s writing is always spot on! I was captivated from start to finish by the dialogue, the smart humour tossed in here or there and the setting of London really brought me back to where I loved some years ago. I felt like I was walking the streets with Adrian as he was unravelling the secrets of his family.
Above everything, The Third Wife by Lisa Jewell is a fast and easy read. I found myself listening to it while in the gym and walking to work without missing a beat of the plot. While there weren’t many plot twists and it became a little predictable towards the middle, I still enjoyed finishing it because I left like I was part of this crazy family. I’m slowly making my way through Lisa Jewell’s books, as they’re all free on my library audio book app. So, stay tuned for more of Jewell’s work!
Read my full review here: https://bit.ly/2P4AdJF
I worked backwards, after reading some of Jewell’s later books. She’s gotten to be a better and tighter writer. This was good but not great, and had some difficulty with holding my interest at first. Early in the book Maya, Adrian’s third wife, steps in front of a bus after a night of drinking. Accident, suicide? This act changes Adrian’s two previous families, both of which contain children, 5 in all. With 5 kids, Maya (the third wife), two ex-wives , a mysterious woman (we discover who she is later), the older son’s girlfriend, and Maya’s best friend it’s a lot to keep track of who is who. The sheer number of characters and responses may be intentional, but it took me a decent portion of the book before I was keeping them all straight. Partway into the book we discover that Maya was receiving bullying emails, presumably from a member of the family, adding to the mystery, as does the disappearing woman initially known as “Jane.” The book picked up steam as I stuck with it, leading to some twists and turns. Not highly recommending this one, but I’d say there’s some interesting components to it. Jewell does have some insight into family and family dynamics that many writers lack.
Not for me. I found my mind wandering half way thru and just could no longer focus on the book.