Switcheroo

This is just a reprinted version of Goldsmith's Switcheroo with a new title and cover.

I had seen the movie "First Wives Club" a few years before and enjoyed it for entertainment's sake (save for those hoaky song and dance routines). I skimmed over a few of Olivia Goldsmith's books but as this one took place in my hometown of Cleveland (as I always thought they were set in New York) this one made me look twice. I'm certainly glad I did as this made me roar with laughter. While I was expecting another woman scorned story, this made you laugh and laugh with some unexpected twists and turns. Our heroin is Sylvie, a middle aged housewife with a seemingly ordinary life. Something has been nagging her lately, something's not right. At first she thinks her unease is due to the fact that she is adjusting to a house without kids (as her kids are off in college), but it's something else. She discovers that her husband, Bob, is having an affair and is devistated. Instead of taking out her wrath on her husband, she confronts "the other woman". The other woman is a bubblehead by name of Marla, but Slyvie is shocked to find out that she is actually a younger version of herself. In a feat almost never undertaken by any writer of fiction let alone real life (with the possible exception of John Derrik and all his gorgeous wives), Sylvie and Marla become friends. In a hilarious plot to get her revenge out on Bob, Sylvie proposes that she and Marla trade places. Thanks to some plastic surgery and wardrobe changes with only Sylvie's mother, Mildred, in on the scheme, they switch. It's one mishap after another as they try to not just concentrate on their plot against Bob, but try to live as the other. This is a hilrious screwball comedy on one hand and a commentary on our wants, needs and gets. Mildred, Slyvie's mother, is a scream as she becomes the unexpected mediator in the plot trying to keep Marla in line ("You can't go out to the country club! You'll be the Cher of Shaker Heights!") and Slyvie from being discovered. As the reader you don't expect to like someone who your husband is cheating on, but you end up liking Marla because she might be dumb and she might be promiscuous, but she and Slyvie somehow manage to be friends in the midst of this disaster. Slyvie especially is liked because you feel her disappointment as well as her need for jealous revenge, but how she somehow achieves it all. This is a tale about getting the things you want then not wanting what you've got, and learning that happiness is something that must be worked at not given. Slyvie says to Marla that she wishes she were her, as Marla gets all the excitement and romance and adventure. Marla says to Slyvie that she wishes she were her, as she gets all the comfort and security and family. In changing places, they see that with these things comes other fallbacks. While Slyvie is enjoying all the romance and enthusiasm that Bob hadn't shown her in years, she is without so much. She finds living as a single person lonely and misses her kids. Marla enjoys a

Sylvie Crandell Schiffer thinks she has everything, the perfect house, great husband, and great children. There is only one thing she wants, she wants to find romance again with her husband Bob. There is one problem, Bob has been acting distant lately and has had no time for her. It gets even worse when Bob gets Sylvie a car she does not want or need for her fortieth birthday.The next day Sylvie dunks the car into the pool and Bob acts unconcerned. This gets Sylvie thinking and she realizes why Bob has been acting the way he does. He is having an affair.Sylvie goes to confront Bob's mistress and finds something strange. The girl (Marla) could be a dead ringer for Sylvie. This gets Sylvie thinking and she comes up with a plan to get even with Bob and maybe-just maybe get Bob back-Switch Places with Marla.The fun begins when Sylvie and Marla actually do switch and all of the adventures and misadventures they have being each other until the very last scene after Thanksgiving dinner.

If I've read a funnier book, I don't remember. It made me laugh out loud! That never happens! It's impossible to be in a bad mood after reading this book. I highly recommend it!

This book was fab!!! I could hardly wait to go home at night to read it!! It is a little unreal for sure, but sometimes that's what makes a book fun. I would have done the same thing if I was in Sylvie's shoes. Make him pay!!!! This was another hit for Olivia and I give it a thumb's up!!!!!