An animal behavior therapist, Miranda has long found comfort and understanding with animals more than people. Since watching the destruction of her parents' marriage and being hurt as a young teenager, Miranda has hidden behind a wall of reserve and privacy. When she finally opens up to love, only to have it traumatically end, Miranda is devastated and confirmed in her belief that animals are much more humane than people. Her unhappy view of men and relationships is only strengthened by watching the ongoing, never progressing relationship of Daisy, her best friend, and her non-committal boyfriend. However, with her successful TV series and puppy parties, Miranda finds happiness in her work and with the animals she treats. Her heartache doubles, though, when she is confronted with a ghost from her past and she is finally forced out of her habitual reticence into revealing to Daisy a startling secret that she's been carrying around for years. When Daisy encourages Miranda to resolve the issue for once and all and unburden herself of the load of guilt she's been carrying, she sets Miranda out on a course of self-discovery and into a new, surprising relationship whose uncertain future relies on forgiveness and restoration...if Miranda is courageous enough to bare her soul to someone who has the greatest ability to destroy all she's worked for. Can she come to grips with her past in order to find peace for the future?What an absolutely wonderful book. I've been a fan of Isabel Wolff's since reading her "A Vintage Affair" and have really enjoyed the chance to backtrack through her earlier works and see how she developed as a writer. Her earliest novels (especially "The Trials of Tiffany Trott") were sadly lacking in the polish, plot development and characterization that she has since developed so well. Somewhere, between that unfortunate and very typical "chick lit" book and this one, however, Isabel took enormous strides as a writer. Here, her skill shines, filled with the humor, intelligently drawn characters and well-sculpted plot that I first came to admire in A Vintage Affair. Isabel deftly spins out Miranda's tale, slowly revealing her past secrets and the hurts that she's endured as the current plot unfolds, and draws the reader in with a wonderful mix of information about animal (including some very funny excerpts about different animal quirks ) and human behavior (highlighted best in Miranda's observations of Daisy's ongoing but never progressing relationship), all told with a sensitivity and charm that is utterly captivating. This book is so much more than chick lit and I recommend it highly (especially if you've got a few neurotic pets of your own!)
A vet who switched job to help animals by focusing on their behavioural problems, is coming to terms with her changed life. She's split from her fiancé and trying to go it alone with just Herman her dachshund. Miranda's best friend has a boyfriend who just isn't committing to her and both of their lives change during the tale. Miranda faces up to the fact that when she was an impressionable teen, she was persuaded to do something in the name of an animal rights movement which resulted in a person being harmed. She wasn't caught and has lived with the secrecy and guilt since, although the person who was really responsible has prospered. He married money and is now an MP. Miranda's mum runs a llama trek outfit and her dad left for the lure of pro golf in America years ago but is now returning. When Miranda engineers a meeting with a dishy but damaged news photographer, she is getting into more than she bargained for. All these ingredients combine over a summer and it makes a great, involved tale, although given everyone's conversation is broken off by phone calls I thought these people should learn to be polite by switching off their phones.
What do You think about Behaving Badly (2006)?
This is the first book of Isabel Wolff's that I haven't burned through very quickly. It could have been that we moved into a new house right in the middle of me reading it, but I don't think that was the only reason. I've been working my way backward through her books, which means that this is an earlier one and I suspect she hadn't quite hit her stride yet. The characters were still interesting, but the plot was a bit tiresome, centring on when the main character was going to tell her love interest a very damaging secret. As the reader, I knew she'd have to tell him eventually and so all the waiting was just boring after a while. Not a thrilling read overall, I'll be more excited when she comes out with something newer.
—Jennifer Whiteford
This is the 3rd book I've read from Isabel Wolff, after "discovering" her last year, and I'm definitely a fan, her books are so much more than just plain chick lit. We've got a strong female figure, that has some problems to solve in her life and that struggles a bit to find and keep the man she loves.I've liked Miranda since the beggining (even though I hate the name Miranda, don't know why!) and I was keeping my fingers crossed for her. As the story is about animals too, it raised the interese and the funny side of it all for me. It really was a very enjoyable read.
—Cláudia
A charming story about a former vet who decides to give up helping animals’ physical ailments and instead work on the emotional side by opening a practice as an animal behaviorist. As the book begins, she just ended an engagement with a man who broke her heart and is struggling with that…in addition to the pit-falls of opening a new practice. Just when things could not get worse, she stumbles upon a man from her past…and that encounter brings back all sorts of bad memories that she feels are unresolved…so she sets out to resolve them. Not exactly high literature, but for “chick lit” it’s well above-average. Wolff’s style and sense of character is not too idiotic (which I find in quite a bit of this genre)…the main character is bright, yet realistic. Sure, some of it is a little unbelievable, but it is fiction…
—Cecilia
