"Ex-Wife" by Ursula Parrott

Long before there was Carrie Bradshaw and "Sex in the City,"  there was Patricia, the title character of "Ex-Wife" by Ursula Parrott. I'd never heard of this book, but it was a best-seller when it was first published -- anonymously -- in 1929.  (A 1930 movie adaptation, "The Divorcee," won a Best Actress Oscar for Norma Shearer, only the third time the award had been handed out at that point.)  

Initially, "Ex-Wife" was more successful than F. Scott Fitzgerald's "The Great Gatsby," probably the best-known book to come out of the period (which was only propelled into "classic" status when it was sent to servicemen during World War 2, among other books they could read during their down time). It was out of print for many years, but was republished in 1989, following the stock market crash of October 1987, and again more recently, along with a new biography of Parrott, "Becoming the Ex-Wife" by Marsha Gordon. (The novel is, apparently, semi-autobiographical.)  

Lyz Lenz -- whose next book, "This American Ex-Wife," will be published in February -- recently chose "Ex-Wife" as the November selection for her Men Yell at Me Substack newsletter's book club. (The first book we discussed, earlier this fall, was "The Farm" by Joanne Ramos -- my review here.)  

Patricia and her husband Peter, both in their early/mid-20s, live and work in New York City, where the spectre of the recent Great War still looms large. They have a busy social life, and an open marriage -- but when Patricia has sex with Peter's friend -- partly in retaliation for Peter's own philandering -- the double standard kicks in and he (hypocritically) calls her a slut and leaves her for another woman. Patricia moves in with another "ex-wife," Lucia, and embarks on a life filled with parties, cocktails, speakeasies and men, all the while hoping to win back the wayward Peter back. (But then, she meets tall, redheaded New York Times reporter Noel...)  

In a nutshell, Patricia must rebuild her life and find new meaning and purpose, after the life she thought was hers is suddenly snatched away from her. (Hmmm, why does this sound familiar?)  

 

"Ex-Wife" is both dated -- a portrait of a very specific time and place (with specific references to events and people of the day -- e.g., President Calvin Coolidge, Leopold & Loeb) -- and strangely familiar to our modern sensibilities. It was considered shocking/scandalous in 1929 -- and still has some power to jolt the modern reader -- with its frank depictions of smoking, drinking, extra-marital sex, one-night stands, miscarriage and baby loss, abortion, rape and domestic violence. It's an intriguing snapshot of a place and time that in some ways wasn't so different from our own, written from a woman's perspective. Consider:  Patricia is a "career woman" who works in advertising, with ambitions for a promotion and her own secretary. She spends most of her money on clothes. (Any film adaptation would be worth seeing for the wardrobe alone, I think...!) By night, she's a party girl, frequenting nightclubs in Harlem and downing multiple cocktails.  She rarely cooks and eats most of her meals in restaurants. She works out at the gymnasium. 

While there are certain "Sex in the City" vibes here (and I thought Patricia's relationships with other women were far more interesting than the men in her life), "Ex-Wife" is not exactly a lighthearted romp through 1920s New York City. The language is Gatsby-esque, and I was both amused and annoyed by Patricia's references to how "old" she is becoming. (She's not even 30 by the end of the book.)  But I appreciated the honest portrayal of a woman learning to roll with the unexpected punches of life, and the way the women support each other throughout the book.   

It will not be everyone's cup of tea, but it's worth a read if you're interested in the period, or in forgotten/ignored books written by female authors, showing the complexities of women's lives.  

3.5 stars on StoryGraph, and (after some internal debate) rounded up to 4 on Goodreads. 

ALI alert: abortion, baby loss and coping with other women's pregnancies. 

This was Book #42 read to date in 2023 (and Book #2 finished in November), bringing me to 93% of my 2023 Goodreads Reading Challenge goal of 45 books. I am (for the moment, anyway...!) 3 books ahead of schedule. :)  You can find reviews of all my books read to date in 2023 tagged as "2023 books."  

Related reading:  

• "She Wrote Frankly About Divorce, and Suffered the Consequences" (New York Times, April 30, 2023) 
• "The Divorce Novel That Captured the Mores of Jazz Age New York" (The New Yorker, May 3, 2023) 
• "Why have you read ‘The Great Gatsby’ but not Ursula Parrott’s ‘Ex-Wife’?" (The Conversation, August 23, 2023) 
• " “Ex-wife,” the novel, by Ursula Parrott!" (Medium, Oct. 9, 2022)