Heartburn

Heartburn was not greeted with wild enthusiasm by the group: Caroline nearly attempted to retrospectively change her choice after starting to read it soon after we last met. She was annoyed by it constant anecdotal diversions. She warmed slightly to the 2nd half of the book, where she felt there was a little more of a plot. Judith felt it compared unfavourable to a book she'd recently read on a similar subject: 'A Summer without Men', Jill found the gossipy tone, and insular high class life style, infuriating and Chris was similarly unimpressed, particularly towards the end of the book where she felt the humour and cookery tips she'd enjoyed early on got much thinner on the ground. I suddenly decided to feel protective towards it, despite my frustrations when I read it (what was fact and what was fiction? why didn't she ever seem to have to do any child care? why was she so calm about having a gun pointed at her head?). We did all agree there were some quite funny scenes (key lime pie throwing, telling Betty Thelma had herpes, mother returning from dead and going off with Mel who was God), and that some of the recipes sounded quite interesting. It was probably also quite ground breaking in its day: she was very much a career woman, the notion of children as grenade in the marriage, challenging men's attitude to fidelity etc etc. Caroline had seen and enjoyed the film years ago, and we all thought it might have been more easily digestible in that format!

Scores:

Caroline: 5
Judith: 5
Jill: 4.5
Chris: 4
Annie: 6.5

quote: 'If I had it to do over again, I would have made a different kind of pie. The pie I threw at Mark made a terrific mess, but a blueberry pie would have been even better'