Babies R Us? (Babyville - Jane Green)

Member Name: karenuk

Product:	Babyville - Jane Green
Date:	18/02/03 (120 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: great read, realistic characters and situations, unputdownable

Disadvantages: none

I am a big fan of chick lit. I love authors like Jill Mansell, Susan Lewis, Madeleine Wickham. I read quite a lot in the genre, but recently I have started to feel a little old. These authors seem to have thin, glamorous heroines with thin, glamorous friends. They are twenty-something, single, without kids.

I am finding it harder to relate to this and although escapism can be a very good thing, sometimes I wish I could read books about ordinary thirty-somethings, with figures larger than size ten, husbands and children. I finally found a book like that and I loved it…

BABYVILLE by Jane Green

I discovered Jane Green maybe three or four years ago. I read Jemima J and Bookends and enjoyed them both. Babyville is her fifth novel, it came out in 2001 and I bought it about a year ago. I bought it from Asda, I can’t remember how much for, but the cover price is £9.99.

It has been on my bookshelf since then, in the front row. This is where I put books I really want to read, but they usually have to wait until I have finished the ones on my bedside table first. Babyville jumped the queue. An overdose of Pratchett and talks with hubby about maybe trying for a baby in the next year or two made this one a priority.

The novel is split into three sections, each one concentrating on the three main characters – although they do overlap, each one is not entirely separate from the others. They are about the three women – Julia, Maeve and Sam.

Julia is in a long-term relationship with Mark. They are trying to have a baby, but getting nowhere and the tension is leading to constant arguments and bad feeling. Would a baby be the answer or is it just a last-minute attempt to save their relationship? Or is there anything left to save?

Maeve is drifting along feeling quite satisfied with her life, but hoping for more. When she is offered another job, she is delighted to accept, confident her ambitions
will be achieved in London and relishing the prospect of changing her lifestyle. She is, however, determined to remain single. But best-laid plans and all that…

Sam has been with her husband Chris for six years. Once a highly passionate and loving relationship, things seem to be declining. As her bulging pregnant stomach transforms into baby George, Sam and Chris find more things are changing than they ever expected – and not all the changes are good ones. With Sam bored and looking elsewhere, can their marriage weather the storm?

This book is a delight. Each character is so well drawn that you can quickly and easily relate to each woman, being able to sympathise with their plight. It is written in a very clever way so that often, you can only see each main character’s side of things. Then as you continue to read, you begin to see other viewpoints until you have a complete picture.

I wasn’t immediately taken with the book. It was easy reading and okay, but it was only about halfway through the first section that it grabbed me and became ‘unputdownable’. I raced through the final two sections, getting through the last 400 or so pages in two days!

It is a refreshing change reading this kind of book. Instead of feeling the people and events of the novel were completely distant and detached from my world, I was nodding along and relating. Many of the things I had experienced myself, nothing was too far-fetched to be unbelievable. Not that each good book has to be realistic, but it is a bonus to occasionally discover one that makes complete sense in this way.

The normality and ordinariness of the characters and their feelings do not, however, mean the book is boring or dull. You get odd glimpses of escapism – New York, glamorous television jobs – but the three women are down to earth, they are capable of having greasy hair and slobbing around a dirty house.

They are R
EAL women. They sometimes make the wrong decision. They fancy the wrong bloke, life becomes boring, they go off sex, they get fed up of their jobs, they cry. They also meet Mr. Right, make new friends, enjoy life and have a lot of fun.

This book covers lots of topics – relationships being the main one – relationships between couples, between friends, between mothers and children, employers and employees. Life isn’t all hearts and flowers here, but it is real. Having a baby doesn’t make life perfect, marriage isn’t an easy road, things don’t often go according to plan.

This book isn’t perfect, but it’s a great read. From the simple but effective baby pink cover to the last word on the last page, I would recommend it. Even the men might enjoy it – I’m sure my husband would have some sympathies with Chris! – but I would certainly suggest any woman who enjoys chick lit should give this a try. If you’re thirty-something, married and have children, I think it should be required reading. Enjoy.

KarenUK xxx

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