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Daughters-in-Law Paperback – April 5, 2011

by Joanna Trollope (Author)

4.0 3,975 ratings

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An elegant, wry, and superbly nuanced story about a woman with three sons—and three daughters in law—who must come to terms with the new configuration of her family.

As Anthony and Rachel Brinkley welcome their third daughter-in-law to the family, they don’t quite realize the profound shift that is about to take place. For different reasons, the Brinkleys’ two previous daughters-in-law hadn’t been able to resist Rachel’s maternal control and Anthony’s gentle charm and had settled into their husbands’ family without rocking the boat.

But Charlotte—very young, very beautiful, and spoiled—has no intention of falling into step with the Brinkleys and wants to establish her own household. Soon Rachel’s sons begin to think of their own houses as home and of their mother’s house as simply the place where their parents live—a necessary and inevitable shift of loyalties that threatens Rachel’s sense of herself, breaks Anthony’s heart, and causes unexpected consequences in all the marriages. Then a crisis brings these changes to the surface, and everyone has to learn what family love means all over again.

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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Short on plot but long on emotion, Trollope's latest (after The Other Family) is a straightforward take on the ways we shape and reshape our idea of family. Though her three sons are grown and married, Rachel is unwilling to let go of her role at the center of their lives, much to the dismay of her daughters-in-law. Responsible Edward, the eldest, feels the burden of being the good son, but his consuming roles as son and brother are jeopardizing his relationship with his own wife, Sigrid, who sacrificed her relationship with her family in Sweden to build a life with him. Rachel and her husband coddled their middle son, Ralph, even matchmaking him with fragile Petra, whose marriage is made uneasy by the large role Ralph's family has in their life. And willful Charlotte quickly finds herself at odds with Rachel after her marriage to youngest son Luke, when Charlotte challenges Rachel's hold on the family's habits. Though genuinely caring, the characters slight each other as they tumble toward individual crises. There's nothing groundbreaking, but it's a decent fix for family drama addicts. (Apr.)
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Review

“Trollope is a quietly brilliant, mesmerizing storyteller. Her readers are fully engaged from the first paragraph of each book to its last sentence, captured by the finely rendered details of the characters' lives and caught up in their struggles.” --Washington Post*

“[Trollope] aims for the heart… and she hits it.”

– The New Yorker

Joanna "
Joanna Trollope creates an impeccably observed world, exploring the vagaries of love and family ties with honest grace.”

--Connie May Fowler, author of How Clarissa Burden Learned to Fly

“[A] thoroughly engaging, intelligent, literate novel.” –Jonathan Yardley, The Washington Post

Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Touchstone; Original edition (April 5, 2011)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 336 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1451618387
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1451618389
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 9.6 ounces
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 5.5 x 0.5 x 8.25 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #2,785,163 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #8,986 in Mothers & Children Fiction
- #24,371 in Women's Domestic Life Fiction
- #44,476 in Contemporary Women Fiction

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4.0 3,975 ratings

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Joanna Trollope

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Joanna Trollope has been writing fiction for more than 30 years. Some of her best known works include The Rector's Wife (her first #1 bestseller), A Village Affair, Other People's Children, and Marrying the Mistress. She was awarded the OBE in the 1996 Queen's Birthday Honors List for services to literature. She lives in England.

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Susan

The dissection of a family

Reviewed in the United States on August 23, 2014

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Few writers can analyze the workings of a family like Joanna Trollope. With the precision of a surgeon, she wields her scalpel, carefully cutting through layers until she reaches her objective. This story is not an unusual one, but to me, that is Ms. Trollope's talent. She can make the ordinary interesting by the clever way she creates her characters.

Rachel and Anthony are the parents of three adult sons. Anthony is a part-time teacher, with a full-time hobby of drawing birds. In order to make his drawings as accurate as possible, he not only watches birds, but dissects them, filling his studio with rather ghoulish bird skeletons. Rachel's bailiwick is her kitchen and her cookery.

Rachel's full-time job for years was the care of her boys. When they married, everything changed for Rachel and less so for Anthony. She could not accept her diminished role in her sons' lives and took her frustration and even anger out on her daughters-in-law. Her jealousy of the young women was palpable and, in most cases, silly. There were times as I read that I wanted to reach through my Kindle and drag the whole lot of immature adults into a room and give them a good talking-to. You can probably imagine that the sons and their wives had no idea what their oft-time thoughtlessness was doing to Rachel's (and consequently Anthony's) psyche.

No spoiler, but I thought the story ended as it should. Many lessons can be learned by in-laws and married couples. I really enjoyed the journey!

2 people found this helpful

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Kathleen Ross

Totally relatable.

Reviewed in the United States on January 6, 2019

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Really enjoyed this book. Character were excellent and relatable. She wrote from so many viewpoints, very well done.

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Dr J H Drielsma

This was an enjoyable book - an easy, light read

Reviewed in the United States on February 20, 2015

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This was an enjoyable book - an easy, light read. Without passing judgment or casting any of her characters as the villain, the author explores the perceptions of each from their own position in the family with their own history shaping their reactions. There may be some who find the book nebulous and would prefer things more clearly defined but, in keeping with the fluidity of family life, the narrative reflects the dynamics so often in evidence in society - nothing too sinister or nasty - nothing too damaging - with an underlying sense of good-will - would that all families operated thus!!!

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gammyjill

Excellent novel about families.

Reviewed in the United States on April 11, 2011

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British author Joanna Trollope is not as well-known in the US as she is in the UK, but I think as more readers discover her work, she'll gain more prominence here, as well she should.

Trollope, the author of about 10 or so previous novels, does not write "chick-lit". The characters in her books - all stand-alones - are extremely well drawn and the plots are not the simple, simpering plots of the average "chick-lit" novels. Trollope writes about families, in general; families that are facing troubled times, either by financial problems or interpersonal relationship problems. The women are not "beautiful", or "brilliant" or any of those empty adjectives used in most works of fiction to tiresomely describe any female. The men are not "handsome", "brilliant", or "fabulously wealthy", either. Joanna Trollope writes about families in England - usually middle class - who have many of the same problems as the rest of us have.

In "Daughters-In-Law" we find Rachel and Anthony, who have raised three sons, all now in their 20's and 30's, and all married off. Rachel - definitely a "mother-in-charge" of her sons, has found it difficult to relinquish the leadership role to the next generation. However, the two older daughters-in-law are, for the most part,content to keep the family dynamics pretty well the same. It is the addition of the youngest son's bride to the family that has added tension and stirred up problems the older two daughters-in-law have pretty well attended to. One of Trollope's great gifts as a writer is to make the secondary characters as interesting in their own rights as the main characters. We want to know what happens because we find all the characters "interesting". (That doesn't mean that an author only should write about "likable" characters; Tova Reich is a master of writing about interesting but venal characters, and her books are always interesting!)

Trollope looks at the interfering-mother-in-law problem from all angles. Grandparents, children, and grandchildren are all viewed in terms of causes or fallout from this problematical woman and her life and family going forward. Joanna Trollope has written a masterful look at the modern family.

23 people found this helpful

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Susan Timmons

Steady, enjoyable novel.

Reviewed in the United States on October 22, 2015

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I love all things Trollope so I decided to read this one by Joanna Trollope. Like the other novels I've read, this one does not overwhelm or awe you but you keep reading. It's simple fare, focusing on the members of one family, living just as so many families do. It kept my interest throughout and was a decent ending, rather abrupt. I can't say how I wish it would have ended but it tie up the loose ends. I would recommend it if you're not seeking abnormal excitement but a very commendable read.Steady, enjoyable

One person found this helpful

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Bellechasse

Thoughtful exploration of this most complicated relationship

Reviewed in the United States on September 3, 2015

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As a mother in law myself, it was very interesting and helpful to follow Trollope's exploration of this multi -layered, often difficult relationship. She deftly presents the point of view of the young daughter in law entering the family, seeking to establish her status, seeking reassurance of being number one for her husband. And then she examines the mother's point of view. The one that raised this amazing young man, for whom she was number one for many years, the matriarch that managed the family for many years. We also see the divided loyalty and the bewilderment of the young men trying to navigate the minefield that develops between their young wives and older parents. It is hard and painful, and the parents usually loose. Just the nature and order of human life. If the parents accept the change and gracefully withdraw from being the center and managers of the family things will work. If they find other focus in their own lives, allowing the young woman to gain confidence in herself, and in her status, the family might continue functioning. Changed profoundly, but still a family, ready to welcome the next generation. Trollope writes well as always, her various characters are interesting and real. I enjoyed this book.

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Ellesse

How I loved this book!

Reviewed in France on November 12, 2016

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This is a very wise and engaging book, perhaps especially relevant for those of us who are daughters-in-law or mothers-in-law. I loved all the different and very real characters in the book and the end, although by no means sentimental and very true to the spirit of the book, was very satisfying. I was sorry to reach the last page - always my litmus test of an excellent book.

One person found this helpful

Elisabeth Budd

Daughters-in-Law

Reviewed in Canada on February 6, 2013

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I don't really hate this book, but I belong to a book club and I have not started reading
this book yet but have to order it early to make sure it is available in time. Will
review after 15th of March when we meet to discuss same book.

One person found this helpful

ukmum

Hit the nail on the head

Reviewed in Germany on June 21, 2014

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It is now some time ago that I read this book, but I remember feeling "how true this is".

Losing power, letting sons and daughters grow up and do their own thing, is hard, but it also frees you up for other things in life.

Have a good read and then think about it.

Kindle Customer

I loved the book and as I have 1 daughter in ...

Reviewed in Australia on August 18, 2015

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I loved the book and as I have 1 daughter in law and 2 daughters, it certainly resonated with me. A very good read.

Katharine Kirby

Too close to home?

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on March 16, 2011

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`Daughters-in-Law' should intuitively reach out and appeal to a hefty chunk of the novel buying demographic. Joanna Trollope knows her market, and I'm well in her sights. Settling cosily into this latest family album I realised that she could be writing about me. I began to recognise the whole scenario with a chilling presentiment. What a rich lode she has struck, writing instructively for her contemporaries, women who have had inevitably to yield authority over their closely reared sons; changing their tactics in order to fulfil secretly held family based ambitions; while busily trying to develop new wiles and strategies.

At first it seems the whole book will be about Rachel but no, this story fans out to her growing and extended family; uncovering hidden dynamics and ambitions, the steely inner strength of her collective Daughters-in-Law and the quiet good sense of her ornithological artist husband Anthony. So each generation of women readers will find something to touch and recognise in the lively Brinkley family who we get to know so quickly.

Joanna Trollope has a beguiling talent for creating perfectly written children to people her plots. For me the innocently unguarded sayings of little Mariella and the touching depictions of Kit the toddler grandson, Barney the baby were worth buying the book for alone. She gets them just right, providing light relief as well as required pathos to the story.

She also has a delicious turn of phrase - my copy of the book already has highlights and reminders marking pertinent observations that resonated rather too strongly for comfort. So I found something personally helpful and useful in them. A series of lessons to take heed of!

No woman is ever allowed to carry on being her confident, possibly outspoken self when the nest is flown and the young birds are now mated; we have to re adjust, re invent and most of all learn to respect the new order. Pandora's box has been opened in `Daughters-in-Law'. Rachel was for her young sons, a `Tiger Mother', one who now cannot yet accept or see clearly what is happening to her life. Sands have shifted, tectonic plates have moved and she is no longer the centre of the universe, or Queen of Hearts. Her kitchen table is not the pivotal haven it once was, a centre of operations, a conference room, and a welcoming buffet. Now she and Anthony must travel grudgingly, grumbling, to London to visit their children in their new homes rather than have everyone always come to them. Three weddings have left her high and dry and we watch with guilty shaudenfraude from the sidelines.

The senior Daughter-in-Law Sigrid, the white-coated Swedish scientist who can coolly dissect motives and analyse emotions has most of the best lines. When talking to her Sisters-in-Law Petra, who is more openly loved and approved of by Anthony and Rachel by dint of being more dependant and initially requiring of nurture, and Charlotte the new young bride; she sensibly points out that Rachel made their husbands what they are, the men they married for love, and she certainly wouldn't want them all back at home again... This came across as impressive, memorable logic.

I really enjoyed the way grown up sons and their wives jostled for position, seniority and authority. Dipping in and out of favour, basking in the warmth of parental approval and then rejecting the offers of help well meant. Feeling they had to eventually include and `fess up' to the parents everything that happened, but only on their own terms. Also that Ralph was the uncontrollable one of the three, the one that set the tables turning. The dominating power of the telephone, carrying apparently reasonable requests for information evolves into being something rather rude and intrusive. As Anthony wisely points out - "Caring confers no right to interfere".

This deceptively simple story is realistically rooted on the coast of Suffolk, Aldeburgh, the RSPB reserve at Minsmere, also London, Arnold Circus, Hoxton, and Marylebone. These geographically opposite places each with their own special charm are all brought to life efficiently and helpfully.

All in all the theme of this book could be summed up in words from it - "Small children, small problems - Big children, big problems "...

42 people found this helpful

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