Except I’m not. Looking like you’re working isn’t quite the same thing as actually working. I haven’t typed a single word. I can think of nothing to say.

Keyes became known for her novels Watermelon, Lucy Sullivan Is Getting Married, Rachel's Holiday, Last Chance Saloon, Anybody Out There, and This Charming Man, which, although written in a light and humorous style, cover themes including alcoholism, depression, addiction, cancer, bereavement, and domestic violence. [1] More than 35 million copies of her novels have been sold, and her works have been translated into 33 languages. [2] Her writing has won both the Irish Popular Fiction Book and the Popular Non-Fiction Book of the Year, each on one occasion, at the Irish Book Awards.If they were previous fans of Marian Keyes then I'd say that it's not one of her best efforts. Due to the sheer amount of slightly 50 Shades of Greyesque kinky sex scenes then I'd advise against gifting it to a relative or playing the audiobook out loud in the house if there are children in the vicinity. But in this event is born the seed of something which will take Stella thousands of miles from her old life, turning an ordinary woman into a superstar, wrenching her whole family apart. For the first time real, honest-to-goodness happiness is just within her reach. One day, sitting in traffic, Stella Sweeney attempts a good deed. The resulting car crash changes her life. Her performance was adequate and not my reason for disliking the book. I just had to get accustomed to her Irish accent which was pleasant. I did not like the way she did male voices. It made them all sound like dim witted thugs.

First Sentence: Can I make one thing clear – no matter what you’ve heard, and I’m sure you’ve heard plenty – I’m not a full-blown Karma-Denier. In the end I grew to find her so annoying and the supporting characters made of cardboard. I was so disappointed. I had expected some cheer and got a lesson on sex with lessons I had never even thought of. That was a real eye opener. I had no idea the Irish were that randy (just kidding).

But even when she’s lying helpless on a hospital bed Stella has a wry sense of the absurd that stops the book ever becoming vaguely sentimental. When Mannix starts asking her for advice, she is “extremely startled by my new incarnation as the wise paralysed woman of Ferrytown”. But as this moving and witty book reminds us, we can never predict what will happen – whatever we feel we deserve. After recovering, Stella finds out that her neurologist, Dr. Mannix Taylor, has compiled and self-published a memoir about her illness. Her discovery comes when she spots a photo of the finished copy in an American tabloid--and it's in the hands of the vice president's wife! As her relationship with Dr. Taylor gets more complicated, Stella struggles to figure out who she was before her illness, who she is now, and who she wants to be while relocating to New York City to pursue a career as a newly minted self-help memoirist.

Every device we sell or rent on the musicMagpie Store goes through an extensive in-house refurbishment process to ensure you're getting a great quality device for a great price. Here's everything you need to know! If you could play editor, what scene or scenes would you have cut from The Woman Who Stole My Life? I really did want Stella to get that second book published but I guess all our fairy tales can't tales can't come true. Ha!! I've been a fan of Marian Keyes's books for a long time, but I haven't enjoyed her last couple as much as I did her earlier work. I keep wanting to give her another chance, so I read this. And wow, am I sorry I did.In saying all of this, once I got into it, I can't complain, it was a book I listened to while I was doing other things and I didn't lose anything from it from not being completely focussed on the book. After she recovers she makes some really odd decisions. A lot of things that are preposterous happen including how she "writes" a book. She has an ex-husband that's an idiot, a daughter who lives in the clouds and a son who hates her. She makes her life so much harder for herself. Funny yet?

In 2021 and 2022, Keyes joined Tara Flynn in a series for BBC Radio 4 called 'Now You're Asking', in which they discussed problems sent in by listeners (they called them 'askers'). Writers will emphasise with Stella, as she sits, typing the word, ‘Arse’, trying, with increasing desperation, to write a follow up book. Couched as an ordinary woman to whom extraordinary things happen, she struggles with her self-worth, and blames herself for her own predicament and for the unhappiness of others. She’s never bitter, but will there be a happy ending for her?

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Stella Sweeney’s life is a mess. Returned to Dublin from New York, her marriage is over, her son hates her, and her divorced best friend’s bitterness against men makes her the very worst company. When her ex decides to give away his house, his business and all his possessions in a misplaced exercise of Karma, it seems life is to become even more complicated. What happens next will take Stella thousands of miles from her old life, turning an ordinary woman into a superstar and, along the way, wrenching her whole family apart . . .