Deceptions [Mass Market Paperback]

Judith Michael (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 1, 1994

Originally published in 1985, a saga about two beautiful identical twins who swop their very different lives for one week, exchanging families and lifestyles.

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Judith Michael is the pen name of husband-and-wife writing team Judith Barnard and Michael Fain, who live in Chicago and Aspen. Among their New York Times bestsellers are the novels Deceptions, Possessions, Private Affairs, Inheritance, A Ruling Passion, Sleeping Beauty, Pot of Gold, and A Tangled Web.

Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 528 pages
• Publisher: Pocket Books (August 1, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0671899546
• ISBN-13: 978-0671899547
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 4.2 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 4.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #608,915 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

24 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars From Europe's high society to the academic circles in the US, May 24, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Deceptions (Mass Market Paperback)

The husband and wife writing team of Judith Michael have produced certain popular novels which are NOT the typical, superficial, and forgettable reads that flood the market. Although in Deceptions, they do lure readers with a soap opera plot (twins switching places), and the reliability of glamorous and exotic locations such as London and China, the authors have included sharp and witty insights and observations in several of the novel's scenarios. We learn about the strong bond between identical twins, Sabrina and Stephanie, and how they developed into two different women leading two different lives. Thankfully, this is not a good twin/evil twin plot. We become immersed in Sabrina's exclusive world of London high society, antique dealerships, and exquisitely designed townhouses. Her more brazen personality allows her to survive quite nicely and make astute dealings among London's elite. Stephanie lives more obscurely in a small university town in the States with her professor husband, Garth. Their domestic, suburban life with their two children and supportive neighbors is surprisingly realistic and at times endearing. The major premise is that the sisters tire of the complications in their lives and decide to switch places. The novel is well structured as the reader flows from Stephanie's adjustment to Sabrina's jet-set life while Sabrina brings her strength and determination to life as a suburban professor's wife. Deceptions is definitely escape literature, but an intelligent read. If you enjoy reading good descriptions of the finer things in life and excellent character development, this book comes highly recommended

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Deceptions is the stuff guilty pleasures are made of, May 30, 2005

By 

R. M Simms "NJeditor" (Fort Lee, NJ) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Deceptions (Mass Market Paperback)

Need a great beach read this summer? Look no further. From the husband-and-wife writing team of Judith Michael comes this potboiler which plays on one of the oldest fantasies in the book: What if you not only had a twin, but decided one day to trade places... just for a little while. What begins as a lark for sisters Stephanie and Sabrina quickly turns into so much more in this surprisingly satisfying read in which, perhaps not surprisingly, we are taught to be grateful for what we have for the grass is not always greener on the other side. For most of us, the perhaps unconscious thrill lies in the story of Stephanie, the twin whose life in suburbia has become almost stifling, especially when compared to that of her exotic, exciting twin sister, Lady Sabrina Longworth. Quicker than you can say, "Hey, what if we traded places?" Stephanie is living the high life, while Sabrina is trading cocktail parties for backyard bar-b-ques. This is classic Judith Michael, who for several years stirred the imagination by taking classic cases of "what if" and spun them into fanciful, frothy books. "What if... you won the lottery?" (Pot Of Gold) "What if... you found out that your newly deceased husband had a rich, secret family he never told you about?" (A Ruling Passion) But with Deceptions, the novel that started it all, the authors crafted perhaps their best "what if" scenario by playing on a theme nearly every one of us has pondered at one time or another. Those looking for a good time could do a whole lot worse than to spend their summer with Stephanie and Sabrina!

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Rarest Sappy Love Story, May 9, 2004

By 

"qtemmzie" - See all my reviews

This review is from: Deceptions (Mass Market Paperback)

When I read Deceptions, I thought it was going to be a sappy-love story. Generally, all love stories have a sappiness; Deceptions was no different. Although, I loved it. It was very enthralling, and it told the story well by developing the characters so you could almost smell and feel the same things they did. I enjoyed Sabrina Longworth's passionate personality, and her sister's loving qualities; but the real story laid with Garth Anderson. He was Stephenie's husband, and he had two children with her. The fact was that Sabrina and Garth met once and strongly disliked each other, but when Sabrina and Stephenie play on Garth with the deception--- they fall in love. A bit predictable, only you expect the story to lie with Stephenie and not Sabrina. Without Stephenie's smaller, and not as developed life-style in Sabrina's world, you wouldn't be able to laugh at all the odd mishappenings that go on within the book. When Sabrina and Garth begin to fall in love, (Garth re-falling in love with his wife who seemed dead for so many years, and Sabrina falling in love with Stephenie's husband) it's comical. It was fun to read about this odd circle the Authors developed. The two sisters, living in swapped worlds, and two men who don't know or care that they are not sleeping with the woman they think--- or for that matter, married to the woman they think. Stephenie kept messing everything up, and Sabrina kept trying to fix it. Then there was Garth who really was just going with it, blind to the obvious deception in front of him. My only objection to how these two people write, the husband and wife team of Judith Michael, is that it is free with swearing and intimacies. All in all, it was a rare, sappy love story, with an intricate plot that had it all: humor, love, and a well developed story back ground. It's well worth the time to read, and it won't take you long because it is so enthralling. Deceptions is the type of book that is just hard to put down at two-thirty in the morning, knowing you have five hours before you get up to work the next day; it's the type of book you keep saying: another chapter, and I swear I'll go to bed.