Infidelity: A Novel

ISBN: 1770411410

Author: Fowles, Stacey May

Condition: New

Review Raises important questions about ennui, the human need for growth, expectations for security through marriage and the eventual breaking down of those expectations in the name of a more real love. -National PostThe question curled up in the novel remains: Was it love that allowed this liberation or was it the act of destroying a life they once deemed valuable? Is the hunger that gnaws at us the desire to be loved, or is it the need to show the world what love makes us capable of doing? Fowles handles these questions with a fleeting lightness, a surprising gentleness, revealing a sorrow that threatens to last longer than passion. -Globe and Mail Product Description This novel probes the reckless impulses behind an extramarital affair, from an author who is an heir to Updike and Cheever (Robert Wiersema, author of Bedtime Story and Before I Wake)Ronnie is a hairdresser who has tried to become a better person to please her fiancé - healthier, well behaved, free of her old bad habits like smoking cigarettes, eating red meat, and indulging in the occasional line of cocaine. As the wedding date approaches - and the pressure to get pregnant intensifies - she finds herself with a sense of unsettled yearning. Then, at a party her husband-to-be is catering, she meets Charlie.An anxiety-ridden, award-winning writer, Charlie feels suffocated by his bread-winning wife and the needs of his autistic child. His torrid affair with Ronnie plays out on office desks and in Toronto hotel rooms. Each is getting something from the other, but as the relationship grows ever riskier, they must decide what it is they truly want, and truly need, and what theyre willing to sacrifice to get it. About the Author Stacey May Fowles is a writer and magazine professional. She is the author of the novels Be Good (Tightrope, 2007) and Fear of Fighting (Invisible, 2008), and her essays have been widely anthologized in collections like Yes Means Yes, First Person Queer, and Nobody Passes. She is a regular contributor to the National Post and currently works at The Walrus. She lives in Toronto, Ontario. Excerpt. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved. InfidelityA NovelBy Stacey May FowlesECW PRESSCopyright 2013 Stacey May FowlesAll rights reserved.ISBN: 978-1-77041-141-8CHAPTER 1Ronnie knew the moment she saw Charlie that she would follow him somewhere. It didn't really matter where, she just knew it would happen sooner or later - that one day she would desert everything important and chase him down. And that somehow it would be worth it.Ronnie wasn't the kind of girl who had ever felt that way about anyone. Ronnie was the kind of girl who rarely felt anything. Since she was young, Ronnie had always been quite skilled at numbing herself to external influence.She was wearing a short black strapless dress and open toed shoes despite the fact that it was the middle of a Toronto December. Her legs were bare, and every time the front door on the two-storey Annex house swung open to let in another reveller she would shiver slightly. Ronnie never dressed this way, generally wore blue jeans, beat-up brown boots, T-shirts and cardigans, but Aaron had asked her to dress up. She had styled her short brown hair, when normally she would have simply let it dry after the shower. She had put on perfume, from an old bottle she found in the back of the medicine cabinet behind a row of prescription medication - a bottle that was a gift from Aaron two Christmases ago.The party, a university affair full of scholars and students and assholes, twinkled with tinsel and blinking white lights. Everyone betrayed the slightest hint of discomfort, straining to have conversations with people they couldn't conceal their contempt for. They were drinking heavily to ease into the situation, and as the night wore on discomfort evolved into inappropriateness. Ronnie felt the burning stare of lechery on the hem of her dress and the curve of her