Private Lives - Emily Edwards
The author’s name and the title over an idyllic, busy-looking British town. A circle at the centre of the image is clear, but the edges are blurry, almost like the town is spinning.
Private Lives by Emily Edwards is set to be published by Bantam on the 19th June 2025.
3.5 Stars
Private Lives follows the interlinked residents of Waverly, a village in the South of England, following the arrival of a new resident, Abi, who unwittingly shakes the fragile happiness of her neighbours when she arrives with her two daughters to start her dream career at PLATE, a new restaurant.
We follow Rosie, a former architect and young mum to three children, in a sexual rut with husband Seb, the new headteacher at Waverly Secondary, as well as Seb’s lifelong best friend Eddy and his wife Anna. The close bond between the four is rocked when Seb admits to Eddy that he had an affair with Abi a few months prior. He thinks that his transgression is comparable to Eddy’s drunken one night stand on a work trip a few years prior, but when Anna finds out that he planned the tryst, all hell breaks loose. PLATE’s opening night gets derailed by the group's argument, and it is soon revealed that Abi is an ex-sex worker.
Will Abi get the fresh start she needs? Will Anna’s crusade against Seb lead to him losing his dream job? How will the boys’ friendship fare in the face of all the drama, and, for that matter, Rosie and Seb’s relationship? And will the many kids involved end up caught in the crossfire? Will Waverly ever know peace again?
This is an intriguing book, and Edwards does a good job of hooking the reader and keeping them hooked. I did find some of the character descriptions overwritten in places, such as when Seb’s mum Eva is first introduced. As well as this, the initial scenes feature a dinner party with lots of characters and it was very hard to keep track of them all, especially for an opening chapter. I would say, however, that there are some great sections of prose, such as the description of nearby village Ruston when Anna takes Eddy there around halfway through the novel, which is brilliantly drawn.
I was incredibly worried that the book would be more SWERF-y (Sex Worker-Exclusionary Radical Feminist) than it was. Yes, it makes sense that some characters would be viciously anti-sex worker, but the moral judgements and criticisms of Abi as a person filter into much of the novel, not just the sections focussing on Anna. The radio scene and the small character of Lucy were very welcome additions because of this.
Overall, a solid book with a host of complex characters (some much more likeable than others), although sometimes I think the book goes out of its way to forgive Anna when it doesn't need to. Aside from Abi’s gay Latine friend Diego, the characters aren't exactly diverse either.
