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Ugh. Not one redeemable character in this book, except maybe the daughter. The men were cheaters, the women who acted like men (re: the non-married women with careers) were also cheaters and the women cheated on were sad sacks who would have done anything, and did, to try to keep their cheating husband. They, of course, were housewives who cooked, cleaned and took care of the children. O, the American couple didn't cheat and weren't pathetic, but nearly everyone else was.

I wanted to reach into the book and SMACK Ria. She just could not get it through her thick skull that her husband had not only cheated on her with a girl half his age, he also got her preggers and was leaving Ria for her. I also wanted to smack all of his mistresses, because he had a bunch, because they all KNEW he was married. It is insanely rude to pursue and sleep with the man of another woman. Not to mention, "once a cheater, always a cheater". O this book made me SO MAD! I can barely type straight I'm so disgusted that stereotypical tripe like this is not only published, but adored.

The cover calls this "heartwarming". I have no idea by who's definition. Wait, the cover also says its an "Oprah" book. That explains it all. Nm.

My first introduction to he writing of Maeve Binchy was her novel Circle of Friends, after which I read The Glass Lake. When I saw that Tara Road was chosen as an Oprah selection, I thought it would be even better.

::: Girl Meets Boy :::

Ria is a pretty if unspectacular girl. She lives with her widowed mother and older sister, takes a secretarial course, and takes a position at a real estate agency, where she meets the gorgeous and ambitious Rosemary and the dashing Danny Lynch. In real life, Danny would have gone for Rosemary, but in Binchy's world, the dashing fellow always goes for the wallflower, and Ria and Danny begin dating, get pregnant, and got married. Danny's ambition leads them to purchase a run-down manse on Tara Road, which Danny believes is a steal in a neighborhood that is up-and-coming. Ria leaves the real estate agency after Danny steals a client, and aligns himself with the prominent businessman Barney McCarthy, an adulterer, risk taker, and all-around slimy character.

With Barney as his role model, Danny ends up leaving Ria for his pregnant 22-year-old girlfriend, and Ria, after a spur-of-the-moment phone call, engages in a house swap with an American woman, Marilyn, who is also going through a crisis. Both women try new things and make changes in their lives over the two months they are in each other's homes, with a happy ending all tied up neatly in a bow.

::: Great Writing in a Bad Novel :::

The great thing about Maeve Binchy's novels is that she can make a bowl of instant pudding into a chocolate torte. Her writing style is rich, and she keeps the action moving with inter-related sub-plots, such as Ria's friend Gertie's marriage to an abusive alcoholic. Binchy also excels at keeping the reader guessing with plot swerves and twists that you never see coming. Even with a large cast of characters, the character development is so incredible that you feel you know each and every one of them, and actually find yourself interested in their stories.

Of course, that makes it sound like I loved this book, and purely from a mechanical standpoint, I did. But I was amazed that Oprah picked this as a selection. Judging from my experience reading Tara Road as well as The Glass Lake and certain parts of Circle of Friends, you'd think that Binchy has some obsession with women who just can't stand up for themselves. Each and every woman in Tara Road, with the possible exception of Marilyn, is wronged by a man (or men) again and again and again, and never seems to learn from it. Gertie stays with her husband even though he beats her and terrifies her children and makes her clean houses of her friends in addition to her regular job to pay for his alcohol. Ria's mother was widowed by a man who left them no insurance and no pension to live. Ria's sister Hilary marries a man more interested in pinching pennies than anything else, and ceases to have sex with her when they don't have children.

And then there is Ria. Tara Road seems as if it is supposed to be a story of triumph, of a woman who built her life around a man only to have her life demolished in front of her, then picks herself up by her bootstraps and moves on. If that was what Ria actually did, I would have been singing the praises of this novel to anyone I met. But the problem is that Ria, just like every other woman in this novel, would still take Danny back. He leaves her for a younger woman. He allows a lien on their wonderful home to finance his boss' shady business dealings. He is the most unbelievably self-centered man in the world, and even after everything he does, Ria would still take him back, and go back to the way things were, and I have a hard time accepting that as a triumph.

::: If She Won't Kick Him to the Curb, I Will :::

Perhaps I wanted more from Ria, and from Tara Road, than is realistic. I know that there are women out there in the same position as Gertie, getting beaten and selling their out-of-touch families on a fairy tale story of a marriage, and like Ria herself, trying hard to stand on her own and still failing because of her obsession with a man who never did love her back. The sheer excellence of Binchy's writing elevates Tara Road to a two-star rating, but that's as high as I'm willing to concede.

This review originally published at Epinions: http://www.epinions.com/review/Tara_R...

This was my first Maeve Binchy and it will not be my last. The story starts with Ria, living in Dublin and married to the charismatic Danny Linch. She believes nothing could be better about her life except to have a third child until the time comes to discuss this possibility with her happily married husband. Only to discover he is having a third child with another woman! Ria’s life is turned inside out and upside down and so are the lives of her young son Brian and 15 year old Annie. Just when things look the worse for Ria she receives a phone call from Marilyn Vine in the US asking if she knows of any houses available for a month or two in the summer. Ria and Marilyn exchange houses and a little bit of their lives for the two months in the summer and Marilyn finds solace and comfort and finally is able to come to terms with the death of her 15 year old son in Ria’s home and amongst Ria’s friends. Ria, on the other hand, finds herself and branches out and learns many things about herself and finds a strength and resolve to move on without Danny.

Good book. Sad that the sweet, nice wife doesn't know the betrayal going on behind her back. Great to see her prosper and grow into her self, while still staying sweet and helping others. I don't know if this book is part of a series, but would love to read the other books if it is.

This book had me screeaaammmiinnngggg crying throwing up. Couldn’t really put it down and was sad when I had to. I want to jump into the book and wished there was another so it could go on and on. 650 pages wasn’t even enough. I loved it.

Watched the film - chucked the book!

Another wonderful book by Maeve Binchy! Tara Road is another story set in the Dublin area, with many of the same characters from Evening Class, Scarlet Feather, Quentins, etc. I love these books, the way there are multiple stories going on that all intertwine (what can I say, I’m a HUGE fan of books with multiple storylines that are interconnected!!).
In a way, each of these Binchy books set in Dublin are also a microcosm of Ireland in the late 1980s to 1990s. I find it fascinating because, while it’s become much more progressive, it’s still quite a ways behind the USA (and in some ways makes me grateful for the freedoms we have here).
Tara Road is about Ria, and her husband and children, and her husband’s boss and his wife, and his mistress, and her friends and neighbors, and their husbands, wives, children, and the people they are having affairs with. Ria’s mother Nora, who prides herself on never popping in unannounced (but who thinks that simply yelling that she’s here when she arrives is sufficient notice), her penny-pinching sister, and her rich and successful friend Rosemary, take a big part of the center stage of the book.
But when everything falls apart for Ria, she’s in danger of losing everything she loves—she decides to do a summer house swap with an American woman whose life is also falling apart.
This book is a romance, and I’d also consider it “chick lit”, but it’s very well written, it’s charming and funny, with well developed characters. I would recommend it to anyone who enjoys romance (but likes their stories to be a bit literary), or who enjoys books with multiple storylines and characters.

Увлекателна книга.

Why this book?

- My MIL said this is one of her go-to comfort books. (She gifted this book to me years ago and her visit this month prompted this read.)
- You are looking for some family drama that isn’t necessarily political.
- You like contemporary Irish pieces and you want an audiobook with the Irish accent.

TBH, it doesn’t matter what I rate this book. I say this because I see why she loves it on a deeper level. And knowing this book has reached her Roman Empire level, I’m not here to criticize it, I just want to understand her passion for it. It will be a great discussion over a cup of tea.

Ria Lynch leads a great life. She and her husband Danny live in a beautiful old restored home on Tara Road in the stylish section of Dublin with their two children Annie and Brian. The couple bought the house when they were first married and the area was more run down so they have done well with their investment as the area became mere gentrified. Danny is a realtor who works for a a property tycoon named Barney McCarthy, a risk taker and a master of the shady real estate deal. Danny's future is closely tied to Barney’s. When Barney makes money so does Danny and when Barney's fortunes fall, Danny's does too. Ria is a stay at home Mum and a great cook. She has many friends and they often stop by the house to chat and sample some of her cooking. Ria is considering having another child, when suddenly things come crashing down on her. Annie is fourteen and Brian is nine when Danny tells her he has a young girlfriend who is pregnant and he wants to marry her.

Marilyn Vine lives one the other side of the Atlantic in Connecticut. She is still trying to get over the death of her sixteen year old son Dale who was killed in a motorcycle accident and has become reclusive, excluding everyone from her life including her husband who has fled to Hawaii on business.

A chance phone call unites the two women and they decide to exchange houses for the summer, hoping a complete change of scenery will help them get over their problems. In doing so, they exchange each other’s lives as they each meet the other’s family, friends and neighbors.

The two, who hardly know one another, are very different people. Ria is extroverted and affectionate and involves everyone in her life, while Marilyn is quiet and reserved, fearful of letting anyone come close to her since the tragedy. Their different personalities affect how they adapt in their new surroundings as they are drawn into lifestyles very different from their own. Ria is shocked to find Marilyn’s neighbors have never entered her house while Marilyn feels overwhelmed at the number of people who drop by whenever they feel like it and extend themselves to help her.

Ria blossoms in her new setting becoming much more independent. She takes computer classes and begins work as a caterer, gaining skills she will need in the future. She also meets and develops a romantic relationship with Marilyn’s brother-in-law.

Back in Dublin, Marilyn, initially overwhelmed by the number of Ria’s friends grows more comfortable in their company and even begins a garden outside. She also develops relationships with Ria’s teenage children and they help her accept the tragedy of her son’s death.

The home exchange teaches both Ria and Marilyn more about themselves and they each learn a secret of the other’s life that they must never reveal.

Binchy fills out the narrative with some interesting sub plots. Marilyn is one of Ria’s best friends. She is a successful but selfish business woman who always thought she would marry at a young age but never did. Although close to Ria, she has betrayed her in the worst way. There is also Gertie, married to an abusive alcoholic husband who she refuses to leave until the inevitable happens. Her sister Sheila returns to Dublin after years in the States but finds Ireland is not the same country she left behind years ago. Colm is Ria’s neighbor, a former alcoholic and a handsome restaurateur who has opened an establishment down the road and is concerned about his sister’s drug addiction.

The story shows how life can change drastically in an unexpected moment. And true to life, it shows how the people around you can be healing and helpful, destructive or supportive. Relationships are sometimes messy and complex.

This is the first Maeve Binchy book I ever read. It had been loaned to me by a friend while I was going through a health crisis and had little ability to concentrate on a complicated plot or a huge slate of characters. This gave me what I wanted and needed at the time, a nice comforting and entertaining read. Binchy’s characters are people we all know, very much like the people we see in our everyday lives. And they have problems we understand because they are similar to the problems we or our friends face at one time or another in our daily lives.

I found Binchy a good story teller and this was just the fix I needed at the time, an easy comfortable read. I sought out many other of her books over the years, finding them a nice relief from murder and mayhem and more complicated fare, but this my first one, remains one of my favorites in her large catalogue of work.

While I realized on reflection I got a lot out of this book, I wish I could say I liked this even more. I read this following a prompt from the 2018 Read Harder Challenge to read an Oprah pick. I enjoyed a number of other Binchy books for their friendly, Irish charm and storytelling about family and community, and expected this to be a great example, given Oprah’s blessing. It felt long and a bit flat, and a bit overwhelming if you identified with the American, which I did. The story, revolving around an old house in a gentrifying area of Dublin, felt a bit too familiar. At least the house didn’t catch fire like in an earlier Binchy book revolving around a building (“Firefly Summer”). I enjoyed the concept of house swapping described here, with the American visitor to Tara Road learning about how life works in Ireland, and I found this the most unexpectedly interesting part of the book – the compare and contrast between Irish and American life. The plot felt more like a background to build this comparison on. In reflection, I did enjoy this more than many of the Binchy books I’ve read (about half so far), but I’m expecting more. I have enjoyed the narration of other Binchy books, often with an overwhelmingly Irish sound to the narrator’s voice. The narrator for the unabridged version of this book didn’t strike me as “Irish” as the others I’ve listened to.