Love in Mid Air
Kim Wright, 2010
Grand Central Publishing
320 pp.
ISBN-13: 9780446540438
Summary
A chance encounter with a stranger on an airplane sends Elyse Bearden into an emotional tailspin. Suddenly Elyse is willing to risk everything: her safe but stale marriage, her seemingly perfect life in an affluent Southern suburb, and her position in the community. She finds herself cutting through all the instincts that say "no" and instead lets "yes" happen.
As Elyse embarks on a risky affair, her longtime friend Kelly and the other women in their book club begin to question their own decisions about love, sex, marriage, and freedom. There are consequences for Elyse, her family, and her circle of close friends, all of whom have an investment in her life continuing as normal. But is normal what she really wants after all? In the end it will take an extraordinary leap of faith for Elyse to find—and follow—her own path to happiness.
An intelligent, sexy, absorbing tale and an honest look at modern-day marriage, Love in Mid Air offers the experience of what it's like to change the course of one's own destiny when finding oneself caught in mid air. (From the publisher.)
Author Bio
Kim Wright has been writing about travel, food, and wine for more than 25 years and is a two-time recipient of the Lowell Thomas Award for Travel Writing. Love in Mid Air is her first novel and she is presently at work on a mystery about Jack the Ripper. (From .)
Book Reviews
Astute and engrossing, this debut is a treat.
People
(Starred review.) Wright hits it out of the park in her debut, an engaging account of a woman contemplating divorce. Despite finally getting her husband, Phil, to attend counseling sessions with her, Elyse Bearden realizes her marriage is dead in the water. Though Phil’s a doting father and a decent man, he’s also the occasional jerk who snickers at his wife in lingerie and is generally indifferent to her. Elyse already knows she’s going to leave her husband when she meets Gerry Kincaid and soon begins an affair that allows her to escape from the crushing banality of her suburban life. Serving as Elyse’s foil is her beautiful best friend, Kelly, now married to an older, wealthy man. While the idea of housewives complaining about their husbands over lunch may strike some as a conventional hen-lit trope, Wright conveys friendships and the blasé everyday with authenticity and telling detail, while passages depicting Elyse’s inner life are rife with the same wit and insight that infuse the dialogue. Though this story is one that readers may have seen many times before, Wright delivers fresh perspective and sympathetic characters few writers can match.
Publishers Weekly
As Elyse questions what she wants out of life, she must weigh the risk of what will happen if, or when, her husband finds out about Gerry. An intense, thoughtful novel about love and friendship, or the lack thereof, in a marriage. —Hilary Hatton
Booklist
With a successful dentist husband, adorable young daughter and close-knit group of female friends, Elyse, like so many heroines who have it all, could not be more miserable. She’s stifled by her suburban life, and she cannot communicate with her taciturn hubby, Phil. She fortunately happens to have a creative outlet (she’s a talented potter) and it is during a flight for work that she finds herself seated next to Gerry, an attractive Boston-based investment banker who, like her, has a spouse at home. The two strangers have an instant rapport, and back at home in Charlotte, N.C., she calls him. That leads to an erotically charged encounter in New York, followed by brief monthly meetings that help to convince her that marrying Phil was a mistake. But while Gerry certainly seems besotted with Elyse, he offers her no promises. Phil, unaware of her infidelity but sensing her growing unease with their life, agrees to marriage counseling, as long as they use his best friend Jeff, their minister, as mediator. Big mistake. Elyse goes along with it while mentally making plans to leave him. Meanwhile, her affluent inner circle senses something is amiss, with her best friend Kelly, herself in a less-than-ideal marriage, feeling threatened by Elyse’s risky behavior. Knowing full well how her actions will impact her entire community, Elyse bides her time, until a shocking act of violence forces a decision. So will she choose her husband, her lover or neither? Sharply written and emotionally accessible, Wright’s debut offers a clear-eyed taste of hope without letting anyone, especially Elyse, off the hook. A modern take on adultery that does not shy away from the costs—and benefits—of a post-marriage life.
Kirkus Reviews
Discussion Questions
1. What do you think the title means? Obviously, Elyse meets Gerry on an airplane but in what other ways does she remain “in mid air” during the course of the novel? At what point, if any, would you say she finally lands?
2. Although the novel is told from Elyse’s point of view, the voices of the other women are a major part of the story and they represent varying, and at times contradictory, perspectives on love and marriage. Are all the viewpoints equally valid? Did you identify primarily with one character or did you find yourself siding with different women at different points in the novel?
3. When Elyse reflects on Kelly’s past affair she says “She was my best friend. It happened to one of us and so, in a way, it happened to both of us.” How do you think Kelly’s painful romantic history influences Elyse’s decisions? How does it influence the role Kelly plays as Elyse’s confidant?
4. What makes Gerry so irresistible to Elyse? Is it merely the fact he isn’t Phil, or are there other qualities in his personality and/or the way the two met that make it believable Elyse would be easily seduced?
5. Is an affair ever forgivable? Do you find Elyse’s situation sympathetic or do you see her as impulsive and selfish? Does the fact she has a child make the situation worse? Do you agree with Kelly that society’s double standard makes an affair more acceptable for a man than for a woman?
6. The story is set in the south and much of the action revolves around the social life of a church. Would Love in Mid-Air be a drastically different book if it were set in another part of the country or could these things happen in any affluent American suburb?
7. While watching a movie starring Elizabeth Taylor, Elyse says that she can’t bear to see other women unhappy and that this is why she moved to a place “where the women hide their pain so well.” Is this accurate? Is there evidence that other women in the group are also hurting or is the statement simply a projection of Elyse’s own state of mind? Is discontent among women really contagious? What signs are there at the end of the book that Elyse’s decisions have had an impact on how the other women view their own lives?
8. It would be easy to see a novel about a married woman who is having an affair as a classic woman-caught-between-two-men sort of story. How is Love in Mid-Air different from your standard love triangle?
9. The book is full of symbols – broken pottery, falling, myopia, vintage movies, the cat, the casseroles, the handcuffs, the old love letters Kelly gives to Elyse, even the fact the women walk in circles for exercise. What do you think these symbols mean to Elyse and how does their significance change through the course of the story?
10. Kelly tells Elyse that an affair is like cocaine because it takes more to get you off every time, and Elyse’s behavior does become increasingly reckless as the novel progresses. Do you think she’s lost touch with reality? That she wants to be caught? That she’s trying to force either Gerry or Phil to react in a way that takes the decision out of her hands?
11. Would things have worked out differently if Elyse and Phil had kept the original marriage counseling session they’d scheduled instead of choosing counseling with Jeff? Did the fact he was their pastor and friend hamper Jeff’s ability to understand what was really going on in their marriage?
12. Lynn is an enigmatic character throughout the book, but especially at the end when, after saying that “Jesus and Elvis and wild horses couldn’t drag me back” she abruptly reconciles with her ex-husband. Elyse imagines why Lynn might return to her marriage. Do you find Elyse’s fantasy plausible or do you think Lynn could have other reasons for going back? Why do you think Elyse’s postcard from Belize was the last to arrive? Why do you think she opts not to read it?
13. We see everything in the book through Elyse’s eyes. How would the story have been different if Kelly had been the narrator?
14. SPOILER ALERT: Elyse is upset that Tory is present during the scene on the church steps and wonders what stories she will tell herself later about what she’s witnessed. How do you think these events – the affair, seeing her father strike her mother, the ultimate divorce – will affect Tory’s future life?
15. SPOILER ALERT: Also in the scene on the church steps, Elyse literally “takes the fall” for something Kelly had done years earlier. Do you consider it ironic that it is her decision to keep Kelly’s letters, and not the affair that pushes the novel to its climax? Although Phil’s actions are surprising and violent, Elyse believes she’s been “set free on a technicality.” Why do you think she compares being struck to a kind of religious grace? Did the reactions of any of the other characters who witness the event surprise you?
16. Elyse clearly changes the most in the course of the novel but there are sizable shifts in other characters as well. How does Gerry change? Belinda? Jeff? Nancy? Phil?
17. Elyse recalls at one point that her grandmother told her “When you marry the man, you marry the life” and she concludes the inverse is also true; if she leaves Phil she will have to leave her comfortable life – i.e., economic security, the church, her close group of friends, and perhaps even her child. Is this what’s happening at the end of the book? Or are there signs that the transition might not be as wrenching as she predicted?
18. Would you say that Love in Mid Air has a happy ending?
(Questions issued by publisher.)