Woman No. 17 by Edan Lepucki

You don't want to be stuck as the 18th woman in Woman No. 17, a contemporary fiction novel written by Edan Lepucki about a single mother living in the Hollywood Hills.

Summary:

Lady Daniels lives in the Hollywood Hills with her teenage son and young toddler son and has decided to take a break from her husband for no other reason than a disagreement they had a few years back. At the same time she is too be writing her memoir about her mute son Seth and she realizes she cannot get that done if she doesn't have help with her toddler.  That is when she finds S, a recent college graduate looking for a job as a nanny.  When she meets S, an artist, she thinks she is the perfect person to be a nanny and take care of her child while she tries desperately to get her book finished.  As the months go by, Lady and S become closer to the point where they're almost best friends.  But deep down, S is hiding her own secrets.  What is going on in S's mind as she sneaks behind Lady's back?

Review:

What I liked: Lepucki gets the readers sucked in immediately at the beginning of the book, making the characters well written.  You may not like the characters because of how she brings out their emotions and their personalities.  I for one couldn't stand Seth and wished he would just speak once and for all.  It was hard for me to even put the book down because I felt like I knew these people.

We instantly knew that S was keeping a secret from Lady, which added to the suspense if she was ever going to be found out.  Lepucki didn't make us wait to find out what this secret was, which I liked.  It flowed well with the story and didn't drag out what S's plan really was.  Going back to how well the characters were written, I really could sense how scary S was once her mind was being overtaken by her secret.  It was almost as if she couldn't separate real life from what she kept hidden.

Though the book switched from S and Lady's point of view, Lepucki did a wonderful job with the transition.  It was never confusing nor did I have to go back and try and figure out what was going on.  It kept the flow going between the two characters and gave us a real insight into the two of them.

What I didn't like: I felt that Kit was a character we didn't need in this book.  Or at least, mentioned in passing.  I couldn't take to her at all and she just got on my nerves.  I don't even know what purpose she had, except that she was the reason Lady was known as woman no.17 and even then, I have no idea why that was even the title of this book. 

Getting through Seth's parts was frustrating.  Lepucki never gave us a reason why he was mute which I found annoying.  There was no closure as to why he was the way he was, and yet he seemed to get away with betraying his mother all the time in the book.  Again, well written, but a horrible character.

I did like Lady at the beginning and felt bad for her and what she'd been going through in life.  But as the book went on, she became unlikeable.  She had no morals and even began sleeping around when she was still married.  I almost felt that she deserved to have what S did to her.

The ending felt incomplete.  Lepucki left it too open that I wanted more.  Maybe closure with everyone involved would've been better.

I give this book 3 out of 5 stars.  Lepucki could've done so much more to make me like this book more. Maybe if there were characters that people could relate to or even like, it would've gotten a higher rating from me.  But sadly, it felt short of me even finding a character to be a favorite.  I also don't see how this could be classified as a mystery.  We already knew from the first few chapters who S was and what she was doing.  There was no mystery to follow or solve.

I received this book from Blogging for Books for an exchange of an honest review.