Anita Jamison's new next-door neighbor--a prim, dominating, and manipulative woman--insinuates herself into Anita's disintegrating family, seducing her husband and winning over her kids, culminating in a violent showdown.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
Amazon.com Review
A comic novel of the new neighbor from hell who looks like an angel. Anita Jamison is no angel: she has a stolid husband and a lawyer boyfriend and is too busy to be overly house-proud or to lavish much attention on her daughters. But when Sue moves in next door as a fussy gingham-aproned ever-smiling paragon, Anita begins to feel threatened. Sue bakes cakes for the Jamisons; she cleans their fridge. Somehow only the kids can see what is really going on, and gradually get an inkling of the truth about Sue.
From Publishers Weekly
This villain of this light and clever suspense novel by the author, as K.K. Beck, of the Jane da Silva novels (Cold Smoked, etc.) is a cheerful, boundlessly energetic psychopath-next-door, whose house exudes domestic perfection. The Jamisons are a young family buckling under stress: David, a former ad exec, is now a depressed house-husband caring for two daughters, while Anita, his disenchanted wife, slogs through a career she never wanted and drifts into an affair. Money and tempers are short. To the rescue: the new neighbor, Sue Heffernan, who carves a tasteful little arch-shaped doorway through the hedge that separates their yards and infiltrates the Jamison household?fixing dinners, giving the floors a quick once-over, straightening clothes in the drawers, taking over the care of the Jamison's younger daughter, Sylvie, and eventually making her attractive, perky self sexually available to David. Lily, the sullen teenager who thinks Sue is a maniac, is the only one with 20/20 vision. David, who doesn't like Sue around at first, gives in. After all, Sue makes things so much easier for him. Readers will develop a hungry curiosity to find out how far Sue will go and what she's really after. Beck maintains an increasingly sinister atmosphere, and when an unexpected death turns out to be premeditated, we know that Sue has only just begun. Beck's deft pacing keeps readers furiously turning pages through the murderous, if implausible, homestretch.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.
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More About the Author
Kathrine K. Beck (also known as K.K. Beck) lives in Seattle, Washington, and is the author of 17 crime novels and one work of nonfiction, "Opal: A Life of Enchantment, Mystery and Madness." Beck is an Edgar award nominee and an Agatha award nominee.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
Bad Neighbors: 'Fatal Attraction' in the suburbs,
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Bad Neighbors (Hardcover)
I first ran across this book at the public library, and immmediately was caught under it's wicked spell. David and Anita Jamison seem like the happily married couple, with two daughters, but underneath the surface, Anita is having an affair with a man at work, and Dave is unemployed, and feels emasculated by Anita going back to work. Enter Sue Heffernan, the new neighbor. She's smart, perky, a June Cleaver type (emphasize the word 'cleaver'..trust me)..who seems to turn David's life around, in more ways than one. I won't give too much away, but Kathrine Beck's darkly comic tale will keep you mesmerized with sharp dialogue, situations that seem very real (Anita and David's separation, her affair with Frank), and an antagonist in Sue you actually root for, even though she makes Glenn Close into a saint. A definite must read.
5.0 out of 5 stars
Here Goes Suburbia,
By A Customer
This review is from: Bad Neighbors (Hardcover)
This is a most marvellous putdown of modern suburbia, of the baby-boomer generation, and the way children are brought up today. On a bookshelf, it should stand right next to the "Stepford Wives" as an explanation of the next generation
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