Other People's Houses by Abbi Waxman

Other People's Houses

by Abbi Waxman

“Abbi Waxman is both irreverent and thoughtful.”—#1 New York Times bestselling author Emily Giffin

The author of The Garden of Small Beginnings returns with a hilarious and poignant new novel about four families, their neighborhood carpool, and the affair that changes everything.

At any given moment in other people's houses, you can find...repressed hopes and dreams...moments of unexpected joy...someone making love on the floor to a man who is most definitely not her husband...

*record scratch*

As the longtime local carpool mom, Frances Bloom is sometimes an unwilling witness to her neighbors' private lives. She knows her cousin is hiding her desire for another baby from her spouse, Bill Horton's wife is mysteriously missing, and now this...

After the shock of seeing Anne Porter in all her extramarital glory, Frances vows to stay in her own lane. But that's a notion easier said than done when Anne's husband throws her out a couple of days later. The repercussions of the affair reverberate through the four carpool families--and Frances finds herself navigating a moral minefield that could make or break a marriage.

Reviewed by Sam@WLABB on

4 of 5 stars

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Rating: 3.5 Stars

Abbi Waxman takes us behind closed doors to see what's happening in other people's houses. She deftly weaves together the lives of these four neighboring families, while exploring issues that many encounter as husbands, as wives, and as parents.

I immediately got a Desperate Housewives vibe from this book, and even found myself reading it in Mary Alice's voice. This was quite pleasing to me, and I very absorbed in the story. I adored Frances immediately. She was witty and wry and her inner monologues were quite hilarious. She was kind of every-woman's woman, and I was able to related to her on multiple levels. Though I have never been married, I am an aging woman and a mother. Frances' lamentations about child rearing, teenaged girls, and growing older totally hit home. I smiled, I laughed, I nodded, I even got choked up a few times.

Aside from the many observations on life, family, and marriage, there was also stories associated with each of the families on Frances' street. Infidelity plays a HUGE role in this story, but it was Bill and Julie's story that had me intrigued, and probably was the most emotional for me as well. But Waxman didn't just focus on the grown up members of this neighborhood. She let us into the heads of the children as well, and they were grappling with some real issues as well.

Yes, many funny things happened, and there were scandalous things too, but some of my favorite parts were the quiet conversations shared between mother and child, husband and wife, and neighbors. There were two really beautiful scenes. One was between Frances' husband, Michael, and the neighbor, Charlie. I loved this exchange, and it sort of won Michael a place in my heart. I also adored a few scenes that occurred between Frances and her eldest daughter, Ava. Ava was such a moody teenager, but then she would share these moments with her mother, that made my heart almost explode. They were so precious.

Overall: An interesting, amusing, and often painfully honest look into what's going on in other people's houses.

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Reading updates

  • Started reading
  • 2 April, 2018: Finished reading
  • 2 April, 2018: Reviewed