Customer Reviews

Puppet

5 star:		(7)
4 star:		(15)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(7)

 

 

Joy Fielding has written many popular books in the past years such as Grand Avenue and Whispers and Lies and I think Lost is sure to be another hit.

Puppet opens with us meeting Amanda Travis, a main character you certainly are not going to love. She is an up and coming attorney living in Florida who is twice divorced, does not like losing cases, and thinks it is ok to sleep with married men.

Out of the blue, her first ex husband Ben calls from Toronto to tell her that her estranged mother has been arrested for shooting a stranger in the Four Season Hotel and he would like her to come home to help. After much deliberation and some extra heat from past relationships knocking at her door, Amanda decided to take a quick trip home. Ben takes Amanda to see her mother the day after she arrives only to be told that her mom, Gwen does not want any kind of defense. She just wants to plead guilty and take her sentence. Being the attorney that she is, Amanda can't take that as an option so she starts digging around to find out the truth behind the shooting. What Amanda gets is a whole lot more than she bargained for when the truth about her past starts catching up to her and life will never be the same.

Puppet was a very quick read with a lot of dialog so be forewarned if you do not like that format in a book. For those of you who have read many of Joy Fieldings past books you will not be surprised to know that she once again throughs in a zinger that you would not have originally guessed and thats all I am saying.

I have to admit that this book started out a little slow, but the minute the pace picked up, it never slowed down until the shocking, surprising ending. If you enjoy suspense, you'll love this well-plotted tale of a dysfunctional family full of hidden secrets!

It's surprising how many readers commenting here seem to feel that the main character in a popular novel always must be a real role model or at least someone with minor or understandable flaws. The white-hat syndrome. Why is that? Here, Joy Fielding clearly presents a main character who is not very admirable or very happy, either. The character's fast mind and quick wit keeps us turning pages, but the author does not intend for the reader to look up to or admire the main character, as shown by her bitterness and unhappiness. (Probably she doesn't want her condemned outright, either--just accepted as a character.) It's too bad that so many people gave up on the book just because the main character is who she is. The plot explores how she became the cynical, self-destructive person she is, what experiences made her who she is. The author is not endorsing such behavior, or else the character would not be so dark and brooding. It is kind of silly to judge a novel like a person for its supposed morality or immorality, anyway, but if you are going to do that, the judgment should be based not on what the subject is (a woman whose life ignores traditional morality) but on what attitude the book takes toward that subject. The attitude here is analytical--to show how she became the way she is (and how, in a very cliched happy ending) she eventually gets beyond all of this behavior to a new beginning.

Popular fiction can seem to cover such extremes (fantasy, history, horror, romance), but all of that, I guess, is really misleading because underneath whatever genre is being used, the range is really pretty constricting--all readers seem to want is a main character who is supergood, someone to look up to, no matter how unrealistic that may be or how unsuitable it is for the kind of conflict that makes for interesting fiction. Readers should consider widening their expectations from the novels they read. Books can provide a role model to look up to--and sometimes other types of people, too, people who can be better understood as we see their pasts. In the book An Experiment in Criticism, C.S. Lewis talked about people who "use" literature for "egoistic castle-building" rather than surrender themselves to the book they are reading open-mindedly. He makes a good point.

Although Joy Fielding had written several books, I have only read two titles before this. One was The First Time which I thought was OK. The second book was Whispers and lies which I loved. When I found Puppet at the library, I couldn't wait to read another psychological thriller because of how I felt about Whispers and Lies. Sadly while I enjoyed three-fourths of the book, by the end, I was left feeling rather disappointed.

Amanda is a 28 year old lawyer living in Florida. With two failed marriages behind her Danielle now finally enjoys a wonderful career, great home and single lifestyle. But this may not last much longer after she receives a phone call from her ex husband, a practicing attorney from her home town in Toronto, Canada. Now Amanda's carefully ordered world is about to crumble when she learns that her mother, whom she has always had a strained relationship with, has just killed a total stranger in the lobby of a hotel. Initially Amanda tells her ex husband this isn't her problem and refuses to fly to Toronto. But then realizing her mother has no other family, Amanda decides to make the trip if even for only a few days. Once there Amanda must not only deal with her mother's refusal to discuss what happened but her mothers stubborness about pleading guilty without explaining her actions. What ensues for readers after this was a roller coaster of events which kept my eyes pealed to the page. But only up to a certain point.

While I raced through the first 200 pages of the book I found there was one real problem I had with the book and that was I didn't find Amanda a totally sympathetic character although she should have been, especially by the end. And the zinger at the end, as I call this revelation proved to be way too creepy for me to really rate this book higher which I originally planned to do. Still when I thought about lowering my rating, I did rate this book higher than I might have because for most of the book I was sitting on the edge of my seat.

I look forward to reading more books by Fielding. But I do hope that her next endings might not be as creepy and disappointing as this one was for me. My feelings reminded me of those readers who also felt cheated by the ending in Whispers and Lies although fro me I never saw that ending coming and therefore loved it. This ending I would never have predicted and when I read it, was really disappointed that Fielding would resort to this rather bizarre shocker.

This was my first novel by Ms. Fielding. Quite a disappointment, sorry to say. The protagonist inspires no empathy. I agree with other reviewers that a novel needn't have a saint or role model as the main character, but Amanda is just whiny, self-absorbed and rude. I lost count, too, of how many times she "whispered into her coat collar" or spoke out loud "without realizing it."

I can't recommend this book as there are so many well-written thrillers/courtroom dramas/mysteries to choose from. Pet peeve: the references to anti-depressants as "psychosis inducing" and a "nightmare world" really irked me. I work in mental health and I hate to see the many beneficial meds lumped in with "suicide pills". A little research would have helped!

Attorney Amanda Travis receives a phone call from her ex-husband telling her that her mother shot and killed a man in the lobby of the Four Seasons Hotel in her hometown of Toronto. Amanda does not have fond memories of her mother, so she is loathe to get involved in this latest crisis. After some soul-searching, she knows she must face the demons of her childhood and her ex-husband, who she left abruptly ten years ago and for whom she still has strong feelings. Amanda arrives in Toronto and confronts her mother about the man she killed. Her mother just wants to plead guilty and be done with it. Amanda cannot let it go without answers to who the man was and his connection to her mother.

PUPPET was an intricately plotted novel. It was suspenseful and hard to put down. The weakness of the book was with the unsympathetic protagonist. It is hard to fully care about a story when you do not like the main character.

Amanda Travis is another unappealing, unpleasant, unsympathetic character who can join the ranks of Fielding's other unappealing, unpleasant, unsympathetic protagonists. The New York Times book review calls Mandy Puppet "beautiful," when there is no evidence to support this subjective statement. Mandy's behavior made her anything but beautiful. A pie in the face for Mandy!

This story is set in 2004. Twice-divorced defense attorney Mandy Puppet Travis (another whinebag lawyer like Jess of "Tell Me No Secrets") has a practice in Florida. Her first husband, Ben, a 1950s wannabe bad boy calls her to defend her mother. Seems Mandy's mother shot a man outside of a hotel and nobody can figure out why. Since the lady isn't talking, Ben figures Mandy can slither back into her life and worm the reasons out of her. Mandy drags her feet at returning to her hometown of Toronto and she certainly wants nothing to do with her mama dearest. Naturally, Mandy and Ben relight one another's fires and admit that when they married, both were too young. Mandy's second marriage to Mr. Travis was the opposite extreme - she married a man much older than she who was genuinely a nice person. She used him and fortunately for him, they parted company.

Mandy acted a fool all throughout the book. She had a pathological aversion for nicknames of any kind and the word "puppet" sent her into orbit. Mandy had no compunction about picking up men and sleeping with them. She just used people and was a tiresome drone. It didn't matter to her if they were married or single. She picked someone up at a gym and later a seatmate on the plane. He went from seatmate to sackmate and Ben actually catches them together. One gets the impression that Mandy the Puppet staged that little scene for Benny-boy's benefit.

No, Mandy the Puppet just isn't a character you can like. She puts one in mind of Elvis' 1956 cover of "Hound Dog," where he says, "they said you was high class, but that was just a lie..." so true in Mandy Puppet's case. The supporting cast of characters are dull and tiresome. The "mysteries" as it turns out is simply a) why Mandy Puppet's mother killed that man; b) the man's identity and c) what connection did a woman with two pre-teen children staying at the hotel have with that man.

By the time you get to the end, you just don't care. You kind of wish they'd all just hop off the puppet stage and run behind the curtain. Talk about a Punch & Judy show! A good song to sum up this book is James & Bobby Purify's 1966 hit, "I'm Your Puppet." The ending, as duly noted by other reviewers was indeed unsatisfactory and yeah, even "creepy," just like Mandy Puppet.

Amanda Travis is determined to have a normal, successful life as a criminal lawyer, in Palm Beach, Florida. As far away from Toronto and her mother as possible. She gets a call from Ben Travis, her first ex-husband that turns her life upside-down. Her mother is in jail for shooting at point-blank range a supposedly complete stranger in the upscale Four Seasons hotel. Her mother is the last person in the world Amanda would want to help. However she does fly to Toronto to find out what happened. Her mother, much to her dismay is not the evil monster she remembers from her childhood. Many memories are created by us as adults, and lack the truth. Amanda is perplexed by her mother's determination to plead guilty. She battles her own past demons and stays at her childhood home. Amanda, the determined lawyer, pursues the case details further and finds out the unsettling truth. The action moves quickly in Puppet, you have to hang on for the ride.

I usually find Joy Fielding's writing to be exceptional. This book did not disappoint! I loved the mix of suspense, sorrow and romance and really liked the chemistry between Ben and Amanda. Joy....keep up the good work and look forward to your next novel!

I just started reading Fielding (A friend recommeded her to me, since I am a big Deaver, Patterson, Hoag & Kellerman fan) but Puppet was very disappointing. The ending was a little far-fetched and I expected more realism. I preferred Missing Pieces over this AND Whispers and Lies.