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by Sarah Dunn
A hilarious and emotionally charged novel about a couple who embark on an open marriage - what could possibly go wrong?
Lucy and Owen, ambitious, thoroughly-therapized New Yorkers, have taken the plunge, trading in their crazy life in a cramped apartment for Beekman, a bucolic Hudson Valley exurb. They've got a two hundred year-old house, an autistic son obsessed with the Titanic, and 17 chickens, at last count. It's the kind of paradise where stay-at-home moms team up to cook the school's "hot lunch," dads grill grass-fed burgers, and, as Lucy observes, "chopping kale has become a certain kind of American housewife's version of chopping wood."
When friends at a wine-soaked dinner party reveal they've made their marriage open, sensible Lucy balks. There's a part of her, though - the part that worries she's become too comfortable being invisible - that's intrigued. Why not try a short marital experiment? Six months, clear ground rules, zero questions asked. When an affair with a man in the city begins to seem more enticing than the happily-ever-after she's known for the past nine years, Lucy must decide what truly makes her happy -"real life," or the "experiment?"
"Starred Review. Dunn's dryly humorous story about a marriage that goes dangerously off-road never loses its groove." - Kirkus
"At times these minor characters' foibles border on the cartoonish, but they nevertheless contribute to an overall levity of tone that helps buoy what could otherwise have become a veritable catalogue of failing relationships." - Publishers Weekly
"Lucy and Owen are relatable, realistic, and resilient, and Dunn's television-writing background is evident in her witty dialogue. She grounds her novel in the minutia of suburban life, contrasting the heady days of new romance with school drop-offs and soccer games. Fans of Matthew Norman, Greg Olear, and Meg Wolitzer will adore this engaging and exhilarating exposé." - Booklist
"Dunn makes her mark in women's fiction with this multilayered novel that takes readers from funny to serious in a story full of truths, lies, and everything in between." - Library Journal
"Daring and darkly funny, Sarah Dunn's The Arrangement is this summer's must-read. Her take on middle-age and family life is wry, poignant and spot-on. Readers will recognize themselves and their friends in this wonderfully comic novel." - Candace Bushnell, author of Sex and the City
"A hilarious, spot-on comedy of the heart about middle-aged marriage and what happens when it goes off the rails." - Maria Semple, author of Where'd You Go, Bernadette
"Ms. Dunn also writes complicated human beings who struggle, make mistakes, and are redeemed. The Arrangement is a novel you'll share with your friends. You'll talk about it. You'll return to it. It's one of those. A keeper." - Adriana Trigiani, author of All the Stars in the Heavens
"The Arrangement is a comic masterpiece that exposes the unbearable paradoxes of love." - Delia Ephron, author of Siracusa
"This story, addictive from the very first pages, becomes not only more tantalizing as it unfolds but also more thought-provoking. The Arrangement will both shock and delight you." - Elin Hilderbrand, author of Here's to Us
This information about The Arrangement was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Sarah Dunn has worked as a senior writer for Murphy Brown and the executive story editor for Spin City. She was a co-producer for Veronica's Closet before leaving TV to write her first novel, The Big Love, which has been translated into 23 languages. She lives in New York City.
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