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The Husband's Secret by Liane Moriarty Summary Study Guide

Detailed plot synopsis reviews of The Husband's Secret


Plot Summary Part 4


The book ends with a final "let's fuck with your mind one more time before we end this" chapter which reveals some key details.


Tess gets pregnant but she is not sure if Will is the father because of all the times Connor sprayed her with his sperm. She doesn't say anything, however, because she doesn't want to start another guilt complex.


And we are told that John-Paul didn't really kill Janie. Janie had a pre-existing heart condition that killed her sort of. The author tries to tell us that any other person who was choked would have survived, but because of Janie's heat condition, she was susceptible to choking and so died of a heart attack.


This makes absolutely zero sense. Even if Janie died of a heart attack, it was brought on by being choked. The author is so intent on messing with our minds one last time, to make us think that John-Paul feels guilt for absolutely no reason, that the story makes no sense. Despite what the author claims, it seems clear that John-Paul's actions led to Janie's death.

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Criticism:


Throughout the book we are repeatedly told the events of the story are intimately connected to the fall of the Berlin Wall. In reality the story really has nothing to do with it, the author was just trying to be cute to give the story a common theme. She'd write part of the story, then flashback to the Berlin Wall. More story, then more Berlin Wall falling. But really, there was no real connection.


The first 160 pages of this book was a cock tease of Cecelia discovering John-Paul's confessionary letter but not reading it. It was purposefully dragged out.


Similarly, once John-Paul's confession is revealed, the rest of the book is mostly Cecelia feeling guilty and John-Paul feeling guilty. It is too much for too little. It's hard for me to understand why someone would write such a depressing book.


I also thought the scene of John-Paul and Cecelia being somewhat satisfied that Polly's arm got run over because it reduced their feelings of guilt was more than a little creepy.


And the bizarre explanation at the end that John-Paul was not really guilty of killing Janie was totally, totally unbelievable.


And finally, John-Paul and Cecelia's story had absolutely nothing to do with Tess's and Will's story. They were totally unrelated. It felt like the bozo who wrote this book wrote the central story about Cecelia, then realized the book was too short, and tacked on Tess's story. An accomplished writer could have written the stories of several individuals but they would have intersected meaningfully at one point.

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Note: the views expressed here are only those of the reviewer(s).
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