WHEN THE NOVEL The
Husband’s Secret came out in
;;;;, Liane Moriarty fans
eagerly gobbled it up. The
Australian author was known
for her way with a plot, and
her four previous books,
including What Alice Forgot
and The Hypnotist’s Love
Story, had their share of twists and turns. But
with The Husband’s Secret, Moriarty moved into
new territory in terms of subject matter: murder.
While not quite a thriller, The Husband’s Secret
marked Moriarty’s passage into dealing with
slightly darker material, prompting one reviewer
to write that reading Moriarty was like “drinking
a pink cosmo laced with arsenic.”
The Connection corresponded with Moriarty,
who was at home in Australia, and asked about
several things—including that quote. “I love that
quote, but I didn’t deliberately set out to write
with a particular mix of light and dark,” she says.
“The Husband’s Secret was definitely darker than
my previous novels, but it wasn’t a conscious
decision; it was just that I came up with a dark
premise. I wasn’t sure if I could carry it off, but it
ended up being the most popular of all my books.”
The book is built around a central mystery: a
note that Cecelia Fitzpatrick finds from her husband, John-Paul. The envelope instructs her to
open it only in the event of his death. The catch
is, he’s still alive. The reader begins to guess at
what’s in the note long before Cecelia opens it,
but the suspense builds because of the way all of
the characters’ stories are interwoven.
Moriarty’s characters feel real, and somehow
they are nearly all relatable. “I don’t necessarily
try to make my characters likable, but I do want
readers to understand them,” Moriarty says. She
says she has a tendency to grow fond of them her-
self, even as she piles darkness on them. “I do
find it hard to torture them. That’s why I don’t
tend to write sequels. In order for there to be a
story, I’d have to shake up their lives with more
drama and I’d rather leave them be.”
Big Little Lies—the basis for an HBO multi-episode drama—is also based on a central mystery with an ensemble cast and braided
narratives. As we get closer to learning what happened to set the action in motion, darker themes
emerge, including violence against women. At
one point, Madeline Mackenzie, one of the book’s
central characters, asks her husband, Ed, if he
knows why two of her female friends who seem to
have nothing in common are so strangely similar.
“They’re both damaged,” Ed replies.
In her fiction, Moriarty gives us a range of
women—some damaged, some engaged in subur-
ban supermom battles and some comically ste-
reotypical. But what’s refreshing is that we see so
many middle-aged women coming to complex
realizations about midlife. “I’ve noticed that as I
age, the characters in my books are aging along
with me,” Moriarty says. “It’s not that I’m delib-
erately setting out to show that women in their
;;s or ;;s or ;;s can still have stories, but of
course they do. Now that I’m ;;, I’m still a person,
not just a generic middle-aged lady.”
Moriarty didn’t start publishing fiction until
she was in her late ;;s. She spent most of her
career working in marketing and copywriting
before she had success with fiction. In fact, she
credits publishing her first novel, Three Wishes,
to what she calls “a fit of sibling rivalry.” When
she found out her sister, Jaclyn Moriarty, was
about to publish a novel, she knew she had some
catching up to do.
Moriarty has certainly caught up, and, in
fact, is working on her next novel as we speak.
Will it be lighter? Will it be even darker? “I can’t
tell you anything about it at the moment,” she
says, “except that my deadline is looming!” C
The author of two books about sewing, Judi Ketteler
is working on a young adult novel.
PENNIE’S PICK
SOME AUTHORS have a way
of pulling you into a story with
characters and details so rich
and real that for a time it’s
hard to imagine they exist only
on the page. Liane Moriarty is
such an author. And she’s so
good at what she does that I
can’t pick just one of her titles; I
am suggesting you read everything you can by her, starting
with Big Little Lies, The
Husband’s Secret and What
Alice Forgot.
Moriarty has a knack for
capturing the day-to-day of
suburban life and pulling back
the curtain to reveal lives that
aren’t nearly as squeaky clean
as they seem from the outside.
The Husband’s Secret, Big
Little Lies and What Alice
Forgot (Item #2017587) will be
available in early December in
most Costco warehouses.
For more book picks,
see page 87.
—Pennie Clark Ianniciello,
Buyer, Books
ARTS&ENTERTAINMENT
Secrets, lies and best-sellers
Liane Moriarty has a knack for keeping readers guessing
Liane Moriarty
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Costco has 50 copies of Liane Moriarty’s The
Hypnotist’s Love Story with signed book plates
to give away. To enter, go to costcoconnection
bookgiveaway.com.
NO PURCHASE, PAYMENT OR OPT-IN OF ANY KIND IS
NECESSARY TO ENTER OR WIN THIS SWEEPSTAKES.
Purchase will not improve odds of winning. Sweepstakes
is sponsored by Costco Wholesale, 1045 Lake Drive,
Issaquah, WA 98027. Open to legal residents of the U. S.
(except Puerto Rico) who are age 18 or older at the time of
entry. One entry per household. Entries must be received
before the January issue is available online, which will
happen around December 26, 2017. Winners will be
randomly selected and noti;ed by mail on or before
February 1, 2018. The value of the prize is $16. Void where
prohibited. Winners are responsible for all applicable federal,
state and local taxes. Odds of winning depend on the
number of eligible entries received. Employees of Costco or
Penguin Random House and their families are not eligible.
SIGNED BOOK GIVEAWAY
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