Customer Reviews
Pippa Who? - By: Love Books, 16 Sep 2008 
I actuallly just read this for the second time before posting a review & liked it slightly better than I did the first time. The writing's elegant but light & therefore easy to read but... I don't believe in Pippa Lee, she's not a real person, & if she were, she's not somebody I'd want to know. There's not reallly much of a plot, & what there is ties up far too conveniently at the end with none of the moral dilemma which would have made it interesting - although given Pippa's previous track record, there wouldn't have been much of a dilemma anyway. It's OK but doesn't hook you in emotionallly, I can't believe they're making a film of it.
Boring and mediocre - By: Jennifer Hawkes, 15 Sep 2008 
I have to wonder what alll the fuss was about with this book. If you take the author out of the equation, then it's a pretty unremarkable piece of work. Indeed, a snapshot of many people's lives, I feel, except for the suicide maybe, & surely not worth a mention by Richard & Judy. Sorry, I must have been missing something. I expected more from Ms Miller.
Overrated and disappointing - By: Curlywurly, 09 Sep 2008 
Was reallly looking forward to reading this book but i have to say that i found it both tedious & uncomfortable. Its dreary style was difficult to concentrate on & the plot line was both unimaginative & uninteresting.
I wouldnt recommend this at alll. I couldnt wait to finish it so that i could move onto another book.
Pleasurable Miasma - By: M. J. Saxton, 08 Sep 2008 
A thoroughly engrossing book, interesting, intriguing & ultimately satisfying.
At first it seems like the average tale of a middle-aged middle class American woman, moving to a respectable neighbourhood & having adventures among the eccentricities of a retirement village. It is engaging enough to make you go with it, as Rebecca Miller fills her characters with a sufficient combination of quirks & ordinariness for you to want to live alongside them a little while.
Then begins the sleep walking for Pippa, & from there the novella itself takes on an ethereal quality that reminds one of dreams, or possibly the drugged states to which she refers in the story. It is a masterful use of style. Sometimes as clear as crystal, sometimes as murky as the places Pippa has inhabited.
You get absorbed into the narrative & accept what happens to the characters & the development of their relationships. Some, like Aunt Trish, sadly disappear from the tale & you wish they would reappear because their function is then too obvious & yet their character is intriguing.
The novella reminds me of nothing so much as the film "Factory Girl." There is also the feel of German mid twentieth century fiction about it.
If I have a complaint about this book, it is that it was too short, & that I feel Rebecca Miller could have produced a more complex weave of characters & story.
An Easy Read of Quality - By: Zosie, 01 Sep 2008 I thoroughly enjoyed this book & devoured it in as few sittings as possible. It is the kind of book that, for me, has too many extraordinary plot twists & character traits to seem completely realistic, but the writing was so good that I was prepared to suspend belief & just go with the story.
The novel begins with Pippa Lee at 50 years old, married to a man 30 years her senior, & moving into a retirement complex. The first part of the book describes her current life, focussing on her relationship with her husband & two adult children. The second part goes back to Pippa's childhood & charts her wild & self-destructive youth up until she meets her husband & changes her life. The final portion of the book returns to the present day, where alll is not right between Pippa & her family, & things have reached breaking point.
I found Pippa to be an interesting if not always likeable character. She seemed to drift through life, easily influenced by others, with little conviction about what she wanted or with any kind of moral compass. Despite this, I liked Pippa. I felt she was very much a product of her childhood & was just a confused, lonely person at heart. I was also interested by a lot of the secondary characters & enjoyed how the author managed to perfectly sum up their personalities in just a few piercing descriptive sentences or lines of dialogue.
Perhaps the one false note was the ending. Part of me feels that the loose ends were alll tied up too neatly, within just a few pages, & perhaps the book could have gone on a bit longer to make the ending more realistic. Furthermore, there was also something that happened near the end of the book that just didn't ring true. I won't give too much away, suffice to say that there was almost a metaphysical element to the ending that I found unsatifying.
Overalll, I have to give this book 5 stars because it is an intelligent, sensitive novel, & also a real page turner. Who could ask for anything more?
