Andrea Newman (1938–2019)

This book promises much but doesn't really deliver much plot at all. The emotions seem very false and it's very hard to believe that people behave like this.

Alex Kyle has two loves his niece Gemma and his work. When he gets a new cleaner David the lives of them all change in ways that are frankly ridiculous. We move from one ludicrous situation to another without any real connection between. I kept reading in the hope things would improve but they didn't and the ending just compounded my feelings.… (meer)

I can imagine that when published in 1969 A BOUQUET OF BARBED WIRE might have caused something of a stir. After all it features a father whose love for his young adult daughter can best be described as unhealthy (at worst, sickeningly creepy), two extra marital affairs, domestic violence perpetrated against a pregnant woman and a woman having sex with her son-in-law. And 45 years later those plot elements should still be enough to make a book interesting if not as shocking as it might have been at the time of its release. But I found it as dull as dishwater.

A dramatic plot is all well and good but, for me, a decent read also needs engaging characters and there really aren’t any here. Peter Manson is the creepily possessive father of Prue, a university student who has, when the book opens, recently married one of her lecturers, Gavin, to whom she is pregnant. Daddy is, to put it mildly, not amused. Rounding out the main cast are Sarah, the poor young woman who unwittingly substitutes for the daughter he can’t have as the object of Peter’s lust and Peter’s wife Cassie, who contributes nothing of interest until near the very end of the novel when she tells her husband of her own wretched affair some years earlier and takes out the dubious honour of most disturbing sexual encounter of the novel when she has sex with the son-in-law she knows has beaten up her daughter. But not one of them, not even Prue whose morality is the soundest of the lot and who really has done nothing to deserve the horror that befalls her, are remotely sympathetic. They’re all self-absorbed and whiney which I admit is a realistic representation of the human race but does anyone want to read about such bores?

In the end the book seemed to me to be trying way too hard to shock and not hard enough to tell a believable, engaging story. It drags along turgidly and predictably and I was well and truly pleased to reach the end.… (meer)

"...if he could have all three of them.... the virgin, the mother & the whore."

This is so much more smutty and exciting than the traditional romance-like cover would have you think. I don't actually know what made me read it, I was in a charity book shop so maybe I thought it was only decent to buy something... either way, I ended up coming home with a novel that looked like it would suit my grandmother more than my dystopian/paranormal-romance/erotica loving self.

I'm glad I didn't pass it along to my grandma.



Cos this book is nasty in a sexy kind of way and Andrea Newman doesn't hold back. It tells the story of Felix, your good old-fashioned womaniser (who is actually hot enough to get away with falling into that stereotype), and the three women he makes it his priority to seduce, those being the aforementioned virgin, mother and whore. The mother is that of the virgin and the wife of Felix's best friend, Richard, she is also the object of a secret desire tht Felix has been harbouring for a couple of decades. The so-called whore is Richard's ex-wife who wants him back but is using every other male as a substitute in the meantime.

Needless to say, they all get caught up in Felix's twisted games and emotions are running high throughout. The sex scenes are good, just enough to keep you interested but never too much. Some people who are that way inclined may find themselves quickly scanning the upcoming chapters for random words like "wet" and "hard" (obviously not something I would do ¬_¬ ). So, yeah, a surprisingly good read that I maybe wrongly categorised as romance because there are no flowers and chocolates... trust me on this. But wasn't sure what else to call it. Would recommend :)… (meer)