417 pages of drama. And Sex, and Narcisism, and Drugs. Did I mention adultery?

Still, each to their own and if the Good Lord had not invented lust, greed and all the other vices, he would not have been able to live the life of a biblical king. And live like a king he did, though he was clever enough not to live too ostentatiously.

Synopsis

To the outside world, Cynthia Tailor is a woman to envy; she has a devoted husband, a lovely home and two gorgeous children. But Cynthia is deeply unhappy with her lot; she has always craved the best things in life, and is determined to see that she gets them. Cynthia will let nothing stand in her way, even if it means devastation and tragedy for those nearest to her. And the casualties are many: her husband Jimmy, weak and unable to fight the wife he can never please; her sister Celeste, from whom Cynthia steals her most precious possession; and her parents, Mary and Jack, who pick up the pieces. But the victims who suffer the most are Cynthia’s children. For James Junior and Gabby, the pain she causes will stay with them for ever.

Set in London, the book has some British aspects to it, it’s a tale of rags-to-riches and dogged fight to get to the top by all means – be it through the underworld or over it. Cunthia * cough * Cynthia – is one of those women you warn your mates about. Demanding, sexy but vicious and a total asshole of a parent.

Cynthia looked at her two children and wondered which one to slap first. Her instincts won and she knocked her son off his chair with a sideswipe. ‘Get out of my sight, you.’

She is super jealous of her sister that she ended up bagging her ex boyfriend – but not because she had him first and ditched him. Only because her sister’s boyfriend was her ex is not enough to bring her jealousy out. It’s because her ex is now doing better than her husband who turned out to be a reliable man stuck in a dead-end job.

None of the characters are good enough to root for. Cynthia is to put it lightly a bitch, her sister a frightened mouse, the husband is spineless drug-addict (with a heavy cocaine usage) and of her two kids, one is a psychopath who kills cats. Maybe Cynthia’s parents? But they’re only good as stand-ins and buffers to her behaviour, never taking the time to educate her properly.

I felt bad for the sister though – mislead by her new husband and deceived by her sister. She’s being manipulated into thinking the world is unsafe by the one woman who decided the best way to be family is to have sex with her husband.

She had gone back to him out of fear, fear of being alone, of having to earn a living, of going back out into the world; the world frightened her, the world was dangerous. Well, so was being in your own home she had learnt. Her house scared her; it was too big, too empty, and she longed for the bedroom of her youth.

The second part of the book is Cynthia vs Gaby as her daughter now reaches teenagedom and is looking to escape her mother’s deadly grasp.

Gaby gets a mob boyfriend too, gets pregnant, and has to fight for custody with her own mother.

You were sixteen and alone, and I know I wasn’t the best mother in the world to you or your brother, but it was different with Cherie. I felt older and wiser. I was ready for the responsibility of a child and, truth be told, was trying to make up to you for everything that had happened in the past. If I had left her with you, you would have fucked up big time. You were just too young, love

Things get heated up enough until Crystal places a fire in her own daughter’s house causing her young one to die of asphyxiation and she’s only found out when Gaby accidentally learns her mother also torched their old place to claim on the insurance money as the house was un-sellable.

It ends in murder and I would say, wouldn’t you do the same?

The book is good but it does waffle on for a bit about how cool Cunthia was and how good with finance and how shitty her husband was for not keeping her in line like a good housewife. I would have loved a different take on this book on how a woman in the 1980s in London could not make it as a mobster by her own rights and had to do some hard things to make a name. I think by villainizing Cynthia as the baddie, Martina Cole lost an opportunity to build a feminist hero. A woman so determined to make it big that she used every weapon in her arsenal – wits, body and power of will to move mountains.