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Black and Blue: A Novel (Random House Reader's Circle) Paperback – March 30, 2010

by Anna Quindlen (Author)

719 customer reviews

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For eighteen years Fran Benedetto kept her secret, hid her bruises. She stayed with Bobby because she wanted her son to have a father, and because, in spite of everything, she loved him. Then one night, when she saw the look on her ten-year-old son’s face, Fran finally made a choice—and ran for both their lives.
Now she is starting over in a city far from home, far from Bobby. In this place she uses a name that isn’t hers, watches over her son, and tries to forget. For the woman who now calls herself Beth, every day is a chance to heal, to put together the pieces of her shattered self. And every day she waits for Bobby to catch up to her. Bobby always said he would never let her go, and despite the ingenuity of her escape, Fran Benedetto is certain of one thing: It is only a matter of time.

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Editorial Reviews

Review

“Intimate and illuminating and, as is true of most anything Quindlen writes, well worth the read.”—People

"Heartbreaking."—Time

"Beautifully paced—keeps the reader anxiously turning the pages." —New York Times Book Review

"A gut-wrencher—another stunner."—Denver Post

"Impossible to put down—the tension is both awful and mesmerizing."—St. Louis Post-Dispatch

"Engrossing—compassionate and tense."—New York Times

"Her best novel yet." —Publishers Weekly

"Absolutely believable—Quindlen writes with power and grace."—Boston Globe

"A moving masterpiece." —Lexington Herald-Leader

A selection of the Literary Guild and Oprah's Book Club

About the Author

ANNA QUINDLEN is the author of two other bestselling novels, Object Lessons and One True Thing. Her New York Times column, "Public & Private," won a Pulitzer Prize in 1992, and a selection of these columns was published as Thinking Out Loud. She is also the author of a collection of her "Life in the 30's" columns, Living Out Loud, and two children's books, The Tree That Came to Stay and Happily Ever After. She lives in New York City.

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Product details

Series: Random House Reader's Circle
Paperback: 320 pages
Publisher: Random House Trade Paperbacks (March 30, 2010)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0812980492
ISBN-13: 978-0812980493
Product Dimensions: 5.1 x 0.6 x 8 inches
Shipping Weight: 8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 719 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #110,292 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #1209 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Women's Fiction > Mothers & Children
- #1374 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Short Stories & Anthologies > Anthologies
- #1900 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Women's Fiction > Friendship

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Brenda Telford

Gritty and fast paced!

July 9, 2016

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

When Detective Harriet Blue was directed to the site of the latest murder, she was convinced it would be another in the Georges River Killer murders. Young women were being brutally killed and left on the banks of the Georges River – but her arrival and subsequent meeting with the first cop on scene, Detective Tate (Tox) Barnes had her gritting her teeth. His assurances that this wasn’t another in the GRK murders had her astounded; but the worst was the toxicity of this particular cop. Everyone hated him – therefore Harry would be hounded by association…

Another team of detectives were trying to locate a retired Queensland couple who had been sailing down the coast and should have docked in Sydney. But there had been no trace of them and the woman on board was in desperate need of medical treatment. Were these two cases linked? Could Harry make the connection before it was too late?

Black & Blue by James Patterson and Aussie author Candice Fox is book #0.5 and the first in the Detective Harriet Blue series with Never Never (book #1) to be released mid-August. Gripping and fast paced, the main character feels (to me) to have a lot of similarities to Eden from Fox’s Archer & Bennett series. Black & Blue is a quick read; a short novella with an explosive twist at the end that I definitely didn’t see coming! I’m keen to read Never, Never soon now! Highly recommended.

15 people found this helpful

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Joan Rogers

A perfect example is the description of the dinners the narrator ...

October 4, 2017

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

Three and a half stars.

More than anything, this book did a lot to clarify for me the difference between genre fiction and literary fiction. Genre fiction is prolific and sloppy in its details--putting color in the writing for the sake of color, rather than for the sake of writing. A perfect example is the description of the dinners the narrator and her husband used to have at their favorite restaurant, enjoying each other's company, with tears of laughter "falling into our shrimp fra diavolo." Any competent editor would have asked: "What significance does this dish have? Do you intend to imply that this is the only meal they ever eat, because as written, this is what they have every time they're together." But no, it's just there, a meaningless detail for the sake of detail rather than in service of the story or the characters.

Things like that are irksome enough without the completely unbelievable ending of the story, which I won't go into partly because of spoilers and partly because I just don't care enough about this book to spend time on it. But trust me: the ending falls into the WTF? category.

Where the book sort of succeeds is in giving a kind-of glimpse into why the hell women have children with partners whom they know to be abusive, terrible people. Fran Benedetto's first-person narrative gives some credible insight regarding where the partner of an abuser might be coming from, as far as the fact that the partner cannot possibly be thinking straight. But that small benefit doesn't compensate for the book's many failures of story and writing, in this reader's opinion.

3 people found this helpful

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May 3, 2018

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

I'm not sure where I read about this book, but it was enough to inspire me to purchase it. Well, that was a big mistake. The ending to the book was out in left field. It negated all the progress the heroine had made to try and recover from the years of verbal and physical abuse from her husband. I had gone through page after page as she slowly picked herself up, trying to become a better mother to her 10-year-old son as they hid from the father.

And then....spoiler alert...

the husband, who was a policeman, found her and started beating her up. She tried to stand up for herself (big improvement from the past), but he knocks her unconscious. The next chapter is four years later; she hasn't seen her son since the father took him, and, by the way, she is married and has a baby girl. What??? And after bringing the reader up to date on the past four years, that's the way the book ends. Apparently the father quit his job, and has been on the run with the son ever since. You want to know what happened to the boy, how is he handling being torn from his mother. You want to scream at the writer, "Give us anything about the boy!" But that's it.

I gave it an extra star instead of one because the first 75% of the book isn't bad.

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Elizabeth B.

Accurate, if not interesting

January 24, 2015

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

I can understand the negative reviews of this book. It does drag on a bit, not much actually happens. However, as a survivor of a physically and emotionally abusive marriage, I found this book cathartic. For those who have never been in an abusive relationship, the long, drawn out comparisons between the characters old and new life are probably repetitive and boring. For those of us who have been, those parts pinpoint exactly what it's like to have come out of such a nightmare - the constant flashbacks, memories, and moments of disbelief that you actually are out of it, along with a weird kind of resentment that you have had to go so far away to get relief. I can also identify with the main character's fear of seeing violent behavior in her son. That is probably the worst thing that could ever happen to a mother who has born a son into a domestic violence situation.
In short, the emotions expressed in this book are realistic and accurate to me. Real domestic violence is not as much of a "David and Goliath" story as we would hope in order to make a riveting plot. The reality is a lot more static - even once a survivor is physically out of the relationship, it takes an extremely long time for them to be emotionally and psychologically out of it.
For those interested in exploring this concept further, I recommend "Why Does He Do That?" by Lundy Bancroft. It is not a novel, but a non-fiction book that provides insight into abusive men.

9 people found this helpful

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Most recent customer reviews

Kindle Customer

Good reading

An easy enjoyAble reading experience.. I enjoyed the slight suspense
of her x finding her. It was believable and explains the drama of battered women

Published 2 days ago

Valencia A Moore

CAPTIVATING!

I enjoyed it and was glad to see the foul language minimized. I love this series and hope that there will be more Harriet Blue.

Published 4 days ago

Catherine Gillis

INTRODUCING HARRIET BLUE, NOT YOUR GARDEN VARIETY DETECTIVE!

I really like this new charactor, Harriet Blue. I read the first three books in reverse order but now have the complete story up to date.Read more

Published 8 days ago

Amazon Customer

Great short story.

Great short story need to read the rest of the Harriet Blue Series. Can't put it down once you start

Published 18 days ago

marge270

Five Stars

Found this book very entertaining

Published 23 days ago

Birdie

It's been a long time since I remember reading this ...

It's been a long time since I remember reading this, but do remember it kept me interested to the end.

Published 25 days ago

Mary Harris

Good Story

Good Read
This was a real page turner. I didn't want it to end. I would hope there is a sequel. I didn't think I would like these Bookshots. Pleasantly surprised .

Published 26 days ago

JP in FWB

Four Stars

Short. Not much to say.

Published 1 month ago

Kindle Customer

One of his best!

I just found a new cop to watch out for, Harriet Blue!

I don't know if this was the introduction of Harriet, but I sure am going to look for her again!Read more

Published 1 month ago

Geri

Excellent Reading

Excited to read the next book by these two authors they never fail to keep one in suspense
What a team!!

Published 1 month ago

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