From Amazon.co.uk
A group of parents, trapped in middle-class stability, deal with marriage, kids and their suburban life in very different ways...There's Todd, the handsome stay-at-home-dad - the one the other mothers admire in a silent look-but-do-not-touch fashion. He's trying (for his wife's sake) to pass his bar exam although he blatantly doesn't want to be a lawyer, and in a desperate attempt to reclaim his youth joins a midnight touch-football team...and starts a passionate affair with Sarah. Sarah is a lapsed feminist who isn't quite sure how she ended up being a traditional wife. She's the kind of mother who (shock horror) is capable of forgetting her daughter's snack, and in a moment's rebellion dares to kiss Todd in front of the mother's group. And let's not forget Sarah's husband, Richard, a successful businessman who develops an obsession for internet exhibitionist Slutty Kay, and consequently spends more time on-line than with his own wife and daughter. A brilliantly perceptive novel and now box-office smash, "Little Children" is a unique mix of the comical and the compassionate - this is the Top 10 bestseller everyone is talking about.

I read this book not long after tackling Revolutionary Road and found similar themes between the two books. American suburbia seems to be an extremely unhappy place (or popular setting for creative works, such as books or films). One of the few books in which you feel sympathy for a convicted paedophile and his poor mother who is also the target of the hate campaign set up by the suburbs.

The climax of the final chapter is breath taking and I found myself talking out loud to the characters. "No, don't do that!" "Aw shit!"

Taking this to the Bookcrossing meet up.

Picked up at the meet, hadn't heard of it or the film before.

I quite enjoyed this, was very entertaining with engaging characters.

left in the Reading Room