Customer Reviews

Our Husband

5 star:		(13)
4 star:		(8)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

What happens when three very different women find they are married to the same man? And then what happens when he suddenly dies and each becomes a suspect in his murder? Readers will find out in OUR HUSBAND the first single-title release by Stephanie Bond (aka Stephanie Bancroft) who has entertained romance readers with her romantic comedies.

However, OUR HUSBAND isn't really a romance, but a comedy with mystery -- and as such it works very well. The three wives couldn't be any more different from one another -- one is a socialite, one a doctor, and the other a stripper! Readers who enjoy the books of authors such as Olivia Goldsmith and Jane Heller are sure to like this book. Filled with the witty repartee which has become Stephanie Bond's forte, readers will laugh out loud at this very enjoyable, entertaining story. I've enjoyed her books ever since IRRESISTIBLE and am thrilled to continue to follow her as she takes this new path.

What a clever book! The story opens with three women rushing to a hospital ER, each of them having been contacted that her husband has been in an auto accident. Only after they have gathered at his bedside, all of them wondering who the other two are, do they discover that the beloved spouse has three wives. Unfortunately, he never had bothered to divorce the first two, making him a trigamist. Not only is the premise clever, but the author is able to sustain the pace right to the end. There is some romance here, but only a bit, and calling this a romance novel is inappropriate. The story has more of a feminist feel, with these women dealing with how they've been wronged. And the book is funny, actually very funny. There are points when the dialogue is hilarious. Ms. Bond is a writer of genuine talent, and I eagerly await her next book.

I was impressed with this off-beat story about three wives and one dead husband. The humor was rich and the mystery great, it had you wondering althrough who the killer was. This is a first from Ms. Bond and I will be reading more from this talented author!

~Take one blonde socialite, post-menopausal and fuming mad. Beatrix always suspected that her husband Raymond Carmichael married her for her money twenty years ago, but never imagined he would take on two more wives in the process!

Take one smart brunett. A very well respected doctor in a small town. Thirty-five-year-old Natalie had only wanted one thing in her marriage to Ray, honesty. This was the very reason she was ready to kill the man when she found out he was married to two other women!

Take a gorgeous redhead, twenty-one and an exotic dancer. Also married to Ray. The only problem here is she was pregnant from the lying jerk!

Fate has thrown these three mismatched women together when the only husband they have ever known gets into a car crash and ends up in the hospital only to be further shocked when all 3 of his wives show up to see how he is! Suddenly he suffers a massive heart attack and leaves the three angry wives to sift through his muddled life.
Fate is nowhere near done with the women and they find themselves in trouble with the law when they are all suspected of killing the man and conspiring with each other, only they all know each one would never do such a cold-blooded thing.
Clues soon begin to surface and the truth is more shocking than what they had imagined. Now they are all in danger and must trust one another to survive this mess!

Very funny and witty. I will always remember these characters! They were all so different, yet I connected with them all and smiled throughout the book. But I have to say, my favorite was Raymond's first wife Beatrix, she was spunky and no-nonsense. The way she handles the women are nothing less than hysterical. Very enjoyable, but I must say, there isn't much romance in the book, its more of a comedy/mystery. But I didn't mind. The wives more than make up for any romance lost in the pages! Well worth the money!!!

Tracy Talley~@

There's a wonderfully lurid basic premise to this book: polygamy, with a murder mystery thrown in. In fact the book moves quickly to the point where the three wives and husband meet. Then it doesn't know what to do with itself and bogs itself down with stereotypes and ridiculous situations.

I'm not fond of books that switch viewpoints with each chapter like a relay race. But to have one (and for a large part of the book, two) characters being unbelievable AND trying to carry chapters on their own is too much to expect the reader to take. The youngest wife is not only a total surface stereotype, but an outdated one. The oldest does begin to gain some little depth by book's end, but not enough. The middle one is the one who should have carried the book completely, for she has the depth, believability and (a little of the) strength needed for a heroine. Unfortunately, she's the one who gets the very quick romance plotline -- something that made me lose all respect for her and her lover because of its timing. She turns out to be rather stupid in matters of life and hasn't really learned any lesson by book's end. Thank goodness she's lucky and finds herself in a good situation. (Btw, this character's brother, a fascinating study in himself, is practically forgotten in the latter part of the book.)

We have a book here that misses having sympathetic characters in it and mistakes gimmick for plot. In the end, this comes off as pure concocted fluff, a particular disappointment because of all the evidence that the author is capable of so much more. Better luck with your next book.

Beatrix, Natalie, and Ruby Lynn possess the identical last name because all three women unknowingly share the same husband Ray Carmichael. The traveling salesman wedded Beatrix over two decades ago. He married Natalie about six years ago. Last year he made Ruby Lynn his third spouse. Ray has never divorced anyone. Legally, he has committed bigamy.

The trio of wives learns about Ray's marital status when he is hospitalized in Paducah, Kentucky due to a car accident. All three show up, shocking one another, but not as much as they stun Ray. Not long afterward, someone kills Ray. The police suspect that one of his wives murdered him in a fit of rage. The three wives form a "club" to not only proves their innocence, but to uncover the identity of Ray's killer.

OUR HUSBAND is an entertaining contemporary tale centering on three females seeking their inner selves following spousal betrayal. The story line is amusing (especially Ruby's reactions) and often filled with suspense. Although well written, the three women never fully develop, as it seems as if there is one too many lead female charcaters. Ray remains an enigma, but that augments the amateur sleuthing by forcing the lead trio to reassess him by comparing notes. Stephanie Bond has provided readers with an enjoyable novel that successfully combines elements from romance, suspense, and mystery into a warm humorous cozy.

Harriet Klausner

Raymond Carmichael gets into a car accident and while on the way to the hospital has a heart attack. At the hospital Beatrix, Natalie and Ruby meet each other-they are all married to Raymond.

Raymond dies after having another heart attack and while the three try to keep out of each others way, but at the funeral they learn that Raymonds death was not an accident, he was murdered.

At different times all three are suspected of killing him, but they know that none of them did. They then decide to work together to find out what really happened the night that Raymond died and catch the real killer. Along the way they relize that they all have more in common than they relized.

All in all, a very entertaining read

I am not a morning person... but I have to give this book a lot of credit. I actually laughed out loud while reading this book at 6 in the morning. I never do that! It is a fun read! If you want a lot of depth, not going to happen... but I love the humor! So yes, I am going to continue to read her books. Thanks Ms. Bond for the entertainment!

This book is about 3 very different women who find out they all share the same husband. They find themselves thrown together trying to figure out who killed their husband and they find out some things about themselves in the process. Stephanie Bond's style is very similar to Janet Evanovich. This similarity is further brought out in the audio version performed by C.J. Critt who does many of the Evanovich audios (One of my favorite readers, BTW). This is not a very deep book, the characters are fairly one dimensional, but still it's a pretty decent read.

I finished Our Husband and it was Stephanie's usual funny read. This book has it all and I loved the ending. The character's were protrayed so realisticly. It was all I hoped for in one of her books.

I had never read anything by this Author before, but I really enjoyed this book. The story revolves around 3 very different women who find out they are all married to the same man. And, they find out that the husband in question isn't all he seemed to be. This book should be classified as a "who dunnit, that has a few laughs in it"
Read for the fun of it!