Yewande Omotoso writes about two elderly women. They are neighbours in an affluent estate in Capetown, South Africa and have both been succesful in their field. Marion, a white woman and widow with adult children, is chair of the neighborhood committee and a pair of binoculars. Hortensia, a black woman, moved to South Africa from Nigeria after Apartheid ended. She is brusque and difficult and the two women have never got along. Her husband dies and Hortensia decides to make changes to her house. Even though you sort of know where this novel is going it isn't as sentimental as you might expect. The reader hears their own stories and the events that have shaped them into the people they are when they were younger and faces the difficulties of being older and less able. Their age, stories and business success, adds layers to the background of South Africa's own story and creates sympathy for two women who are both difficult to like. ( )

South Africa. Two women, elderly widows, both of whom had impressive careers in design fields. And they have hated each other for years. But circumstances bring them together, so they can both get what they want in the short term--but each has something the other cannot have.

Omotoso uses these women, Hortensia (black, from Barbados but raised in London, came to South Africa from Nigeria) and Marion (white, the daughter of Polish Jews who fled and abandoned their religion out of fear), as well as their community, to tell a story of modern South Africa. Of how people have been treated and how many still are, of how property rights are a knot of cheating that was legal when it occurred, of never knowing what others' dreams might be. Both women carry a lot of guilt/regret for very different reasons.

Omotoso was also born in Barbados (where her mother is from), and was raised in Nigeria, and has lived in South Africa for nearly twenty years. ( )

I really liked this book. It was nice reading a book featuring mature women who were complex and showed real growth. Although the women were not likable, they ended up winning me over despite of their flaws. One could also view the story as an allegory for post apartheid South Africa. I am glad I picked this one up. ( )

Two old ladies live next door to each other in a fancy neighborhood in Cape Town, South Africa. They seem to be extremely different -- starting with the fact that one is black and one is white -- but have, perhaps, quite a few things in common... including a generous helping of bitterness. And they thoroughly hate each other's guts.

This is one of those books I feel like I sort of wanted to like more than I actually did. The main characters are interestingly complicated (even if one of them is more developed and clearly dearer to the author's heart than the other), and the novel dips into some important and difficult themes -- racism, the terrible history of South Africa, the difficulties faced by professional women -- in a fairly nuanced way. But after a while, I fear I grew a little tired of these women's company. That feeling lessened by the end, at which point we know enough about them to feel some real sympathy for them. But the more their relationship developed, the less realistic I felt their dialog was. And in the end, I'm left not entirely sure how I feel about the novel as a whole. There's a fair amount in it that felt interesting, or touching, or insightful, at least a little. But perhaps just not quite as much as I wanted. ( )

A good read set in the leafy suburb of Constantia in Cape Town. Funny at times. I got drawn in to the story and read it in a day. ( )