Keeping Up Appearances
Written by Tricia Stringer
Narrated by Rebecca Macauley
3.5/5
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About this audiobook
As tensions simmer in a small country town, three women are going to need more than CWA sausage rolls and can-do community spirit to put things right. From a bestselling Australian author comes a delightful novel full of practical wisdom and dry humour that examines female friendship, buried secrets and why honesty is (usually) the best policy.
Privacy is hard to maintain in Badara, the kind of small Australian country town where everyone knows everyone else's business. So discovers single mum Paige when she and her three children arrive from the city seeking refuge. Paige's only respite from child care and loneliness is the Tuesday gym club, where she had feared the judgement of the town matriarchs, but she is met only with generosity and a plethora of baked goods. Besides, both the brusque Marion and her polished sister-in-law Briony are too busy dealing with their own dramas to examine hers.
Well-to-do farmer's wife and proud mother Briony is in full denial of her family's troubles. Even with her eldest daughter's marriage in ruins and her son Blake's recent bombshell. Suddenly Briony and husband Vince have a full house again - and the piles of laundry aren't the only dirty linen that's about to be aired.
For Marion, the unearthing of a time capsule - its contents to be read at the Celebrate Badara weekend - is a disaster. She was only a teenager when she wrote down those poisonous words, but that doesn't mean she won't lose friends and family if they hear what she really thinks of them - especially as the letter reveals their darkest secrets to the world.
When the truth comes out for Badara, keeping up appearances may no longer be an option for anyone ...
Tricia Stringer
Tricia Stringer is a bestselling and multiple award-winning author. Her books include Back on Track, Keeping Up Appearances, Birds of a Feather, The Family Inheritance, The Model Wife, Table for Eight, seven rural romances and a historical saga set in the unforgiving landscape of nineteenth-century Flinders Ranges. Tricia grew up on a farm in country South Australia and has spent most of her life in rural communities, as owner of a post office and bookshop, as a teacher and librarian, and now as a full-time writer. She lives on the traditional lands of the Narungga people, in the beautiful Copper Coast region, with her husband Daryl, travelling and exploring Australia's diverse communities and landscapes, and sharing her passion for the country and its people through her authentic stories and their vivid characters. For further information and to sign up for her quarterly newsletter go to triciastringer.com or connect with Tricia on Facebook or Instagram @triciastringerauthor
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Reviews for Keeping Up Appearances
3 ratings1 review
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Keeping Up Appearances is an engaging contemporary rural fiction drama from bestselling Australian author, Trish Stringer.In the small South Australian town of Badara the suggestion to raise money to repair the community hall. Home to several local groups, including a new fitness class, the decision is made to stage a ‘Celebrate Badara’ event to include a fair, local tours, a formal dinner and the opening of a time capsule buried fifty years before.Life-long resident and retired schoolteacher Marion Addicot is happy to take charge of the event, until the memory of the spiteful contribution she and her best friend made to the time capsule as sixteen year olds comes back to her.Though she wouldn’t dream of refusing to help, Marion’s wealthy sister-in-law, Briony Hensley is exhausted at the thought of taking on yet another responsibility, but that concern is eclipsed when her adult children return home with revelations that threaten her well ordered world.Town newcomer and single mother of three, Paige Radcliffe, isn’t at all interested in the celebration, or the women involved, whom she fears will judge her, but when the fitness class needs a space during the renovations to the hall, and the old store premises attached to her rented home are commandeered, Paige realises she may have misjudged them.Each woman grapples with their own personal issues over the course of a few months, though there is a common thread, all are desperate to keep up appearances to protect themselves, and others, from real and imagined consequences. But the truth has a way of coming out. Stringer thoughtfully explores their worries and fears and the ways in which they handle the aftermath. Marion, Briony and Paige all exhibit personal growth Stringer is excellent at creating authentic communities for her main characters to inhabit. I enjoyed the small town setting which is populated with ordinary people at different ages and stages of life, all of whom are well-drawn, and further enrich the story.An engaging novel about secrets, charades and community, Keeping Up Appearances is a warm-hearted, satisfying read.