Sudden Rain [Paperback]

Maritta Wolff (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 1, 2005

In 1972, in the suburbs around L.A., traditional housewives in their 30s and 40s are starting to ask whether they are satisfied by their everyday lives; meanwhile, a young woman in her early 20s feels paralyzed by her options. The story centers around five middle-class, L.A. couples of three different generations and the ways in which their relationships and home lives are affected by the trends (specifically the rise in divorce and feminism) of the time. Maritta Wolff's moving, compelling novel takes place in one stormy L.A. weekend, as a literal fog of unrest blows into town, and alters these marriages forever.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. The author of six previous novels, Wolff (1918–2002) hid this one, her seventh, in her refrigerator for 30 years. And it does feel frozen in time, a brilliant, noirish cultural commentary on upheaval in American marriage and politics, circa 1970. >From the novel's first scene—a tense tour of a Los Angeles divorce court, where a stressed housewife mulls monogamy and stumbles into a mystery in the ladies' room—it's clear the reader is in the hands of a philosopher who can spin the heck out of a story, too. Over a four-day weekend and 400-some pages, the author brings a half-dozen Southern California families to the boiling point, calling on the forces of nature (human and elemental) to portray the trouble she sees brewing in suburbia. And trouble—much of it deadly—is oozing out everywhere, from the cracks and chasms that have appeared between husbands and wives, parents and children, humans and planet. Wolff weaves the era's social upheaval into each foreboding page, but it's her devastating insight into what people say and do when they're disappointed with each other that makes this book a page-turner. The author was only 22 when she first made readers ache for badly behaved lovers and their country, both at a critical crossroads in 1941's Whistle Stop. Wolff wrote this novel with 30 more years, two marriages and motherhood under her belt. Her experience shows, in all the right ways. (Apr.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

This book's backstory is more compelling than the novel itself. Wolff's first book, Whistle Stop (1941), was published to great acclaim when she was 22. She went on to publish five more novels, but when her publisher asked her to do promotion for her seventh, she refused and put her manuscript in the refrigerator, where it remained for 30 years, until her death. Set in L.A. during the seventies, the novel tracks five disaffected couples, ranging in age from their early twenties to their late sixties, over the course of one weekend. The novel works as a meticulously detailed portrait of a certain time and place, anticipating a whole host of social trends, including the skyrocketing divorce rate, the ecology movement, and women's liberation. Unfortunately, the novel is dialogue heavy and, as a result, seems outdated, riddled as it is with exclamation points, quaint swear words, and too many "darlings" and "sweeties." Still, the plot, which takes some unexpected, sudden turns, makes for addictive reading, and Wolff does a remarkable job of individuating her multiple characters. Joanne Wilkinson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 400 pages
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster (June 1, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0743248090
• ISBN-13: 978-0743468770
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6 x 1.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,157,379 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A compulsive page-turner, October 23, 2006

By 

N. K. Shapiro "nancykayshapiro.com" (New York, NY United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Sudden Rain: A Novel (Paperback)

Bought this on the recommendation of my fave brick'n'morter bookseller, who told me "It's about upper middle class people behaving badly in Los Angeles--what's not to like!"

It's about that but it's also about people behaving well. The couples who populate this engaging fast-moving novel are all intertwined--socially, through business, and through family. Over the course of one three-day weekend, we ride along into the crescendos of their lives.

The novel is also an engaging time capsule of life in a particular place at a particular time--1972. The prevalent issues then (many of which are still controversial now), come up in the normal course of the events of the story--feminism, abortion, middle-class anomie, rising divorce rate, changing marital expectations, ecology, war.

A marvelous novel, thoroughly entertaining.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Left-overs, October 31, 2005

By 

D. West "Bones" (Boise, Idaho United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

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This review is from: Sudden Rain: A Novel (Hardcover)

This book sat in a refrigerator for 30 years before being published. Unfortunately, I can see why. Although, some of the author's "conversations among characters" were good, a lot of it was trivial, regardless of the time period in which it was written. Although I was young in the 70s, I have a hard time remembering women's lib in quite the way it was written here.

But, I guess the biggest disappointment for me was that I never felt that anything was ever brought to final closure. That last chapter "Pete," in particular. was very unsatisfying.

Had it been published in the 70s, it may have been a bigger success, but again, this was a rather disappointing read.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars "We're all on other marriages and divorces now. Isn't it fierce?", January 19, 2007

By 

Mary Whipple (New England) - See all my reviews
(COMMUNITY FORUM 04)    (TOP 100 REVIEWER)    (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Sudden Rain: A Novel (Paperback)

In what may be the consummate depiction of the early 1970s, Maritta Wolff recreates Los Angeles suburbia--its attitudes, values, concerns, and goals--or lack of them. Her rapier-sharp satire focuses on the shallow lifestyle, the self-indulgence, the disregard for the wider world and the environment, and the prescribed roles into which both the men and women force themselves. Following the lives of several families from three different generations--the twenty-somethings, those in their forties who have young children, and those who are within five or ten years of retirement--she makes the entire period come vibrantly alive, every detail perfectly rendered to create atmosphere and reveal lifestyle and mores.

Her characters range from the college junior who has already filed for divorce after just eight months of marriage (and who is now living with a revolutionary intent on overthrowing the government), to two men nearing sixty who suddenly find the loves of their lives (despite the fact that one or the other of them is married), and also include a depressed woman whose three children and all their activities cannot fill the void in her life or provide her with a sense of purpose or fulfillment. The characters, while shallow in their values and motivations, are fully drawn, making their complaints and the waste of their lives that much more poignant.

All the action takes place over a long, hot weekend in the summer, the dry air, blistering Santa Ana winds, and potential for forest fires symbolizing the arid lives of the characters, the passions and emotions by which they live, and the explosive actions which will change all their lives by the end of the weekend. Even in her conclusion, however, the author remains true to life--she does not tie up all the details, and she leaves many questions unanswered for the reader to ponder. The characters soldier on, dealing with their messes and the damage they inflict.

Drawing little attention to her "writing style," Wolff creates characters who perfectly represent suburban life in the early seventies, every conversation true to life, every action plausible and consistent with the character, and every flaw of this society and its people revealed for all the world to see. Sudden Rain holds up a mirror, and the reflection is not a pretty sight. n Mary Whipple