Thank you NetGalley for the ARC of Woman No.17 this was a interesting read and full of twists and turns. I would recommend this book to my circle of readers.

This is a bit of an unusual book. It has elements of Ali Smith's classic The Accidental. A woman wanders into the slow-motion crisis of a family of four and upends their lives. The same happens in Woman No. 17 where a young woman enters as a housekeeper and nanny for a mother whose marriage and relationship with her teenage son are in crisis. Instead of being some sort of mystical force that heals things, she helps rip them apart. The tearing is needed, but it is certainly painful to endure. I wasn't sure what was resolved in the end, but the situations are very relatable.

Could not get into this, ultimately DNF. Didn’t connect with the characters, and the writing felt clunky. Really wanted to like this one.

I had to make myself finish this book. The writing style was great, I just couldn't get into the story.

3.5 stars.

The writing was fine and the premise interesting but I was slightly underwhelmed by this book. It had so much possibility, but never quite fulfilled the promise of the plot.

LitReactor.com Review by Joshua Chaplinsky

itle:

Woman No. 17
Who wrote it?
From page one I was invested in Lepucki's flawed characters, even though I would probably hate them in real life.

Edan Lepucki, author of Stephen Colbert favorite, California.
Plot in a box:

Estranged lady-writer Lady Daniels hires a nanny so she can finish her book. Enter S, a young artist who is not what she seems.
Invent a new title for this book:

Performance Artist for Hire
Read this if you like(d):

Probably California, although I haven't read it. Also, California.
Meet the book’s lead(s):

Lady Daniels: A mother and writer estranged from her husband.

Seth: Lady's mute teenage son.

Esther/S: The young artist hired to help watch Lady's toddler, Devin (who doesn't warrant being considered a lead for our purposes).
Said lead(s) would be portrayed in a movie by:

Lady: Brit Marling (Another Earth, The OA) in about 5 years.

Seth: Chandler Riggs (CORAL!), of Walking Dead fame. He can sulk, and we wouldn't have to hear him talk.

Esther/S: Hailee Steinfeld (True Grit, Edge of Seventeen), who already has experience starring in films with the number 17 in the title.
Setting: Would you want to live there?

I dallied with the romantic notion of moving to California when I was a young rock n' roller, but after visiting enough times I got over that.
What was your favorite sentence?

Sure, Seth had left her womb and never returned, but he was the one who had to do the leaving.

The Verdict:

Woman No. 17 was first brought to my attention by Richard Thomas, in his 10 Highly Anticipated Books for 2017 column. In it, he referenced both Steve Erickson and David Lynch's Mulholland Dr. as possible touchstones. The ad copy billed it as a sinister, sexy noir about art, motherhood, and the intensity of female friendships, set in the posh hills above Los Angeles. I was sold.

Well, I didn't find Woman No. 17 to be particularly noirish, at least not in the traditional sense, and ideas of identity aside, it certainly wasn't very Lynchian. But that's okay, because I still really liked it. From page one I was invested in Lepucki's flawed characters, even though I would probably hate them in real life. You could say I was absorbed in their self-absorption.

Look, I get it. Publishers don't consider motherhood or female friendships "sexy," and books ain't gonna sell themselves. But they should have trusted in the quality of the storytelling here. Fortunately that quality will be apparent to anyone who gives the book a chance.

This book was unfortunately not for me! Thanks for the opportunity!

Forty-something Lady Daniels is recently separated from her ten years older husband and now needs help taking care of their toddler son so she can focus on writing a memoir that focuses on her life with now eighteen-year-old non-verbal son Seth. She places an ad for a live-in nanny for the summer, and Esther Fowler responds to the Craiglist ad and is the first interview. While Lady doesn’t check things out too deeply, she feels that she can trust Esther after they hit it off right away. Lady hires her after son Devin takes to her immediately without consulting practical husband Karl, which complicates their marriage further. Told in both Lady and S’s points of view, you get both of their troubled histories with men and their mothers, and you definitely see how this shapes them into women who aren’t models of good behavior in the present day.

Lady’s under contract to write this book, but she’s blocked and having a hard time taking care of her sons and a home since she asked Karl to move out on a trial basis. Even though Karl isn’t Seth’s father, she’s feeling betrayed by the closeness between the two of them, and even the relationship between Karl’s artist twin sister Kat and Seth, so she’s trying to distance everyone–even if she’s failing miserably at controlling everything around her. But introducing Esther–who now only wants to be called “S”–is a blessing and a curse. Lady hasn’t always been the most maternal with her second son, Devin, and she’s soon a little jealous of S. She also finds out that she’s almost always the last person to know what Seth is up to–at school and in his personal life. He’s feeling smothered, and he’s lashing out in the only ways he can gain control. While Lady had feelings of abandonment throughout her life, she was definitely holding on to Seth too tight while pushing everyone else away.

While Lady struggles with her guilt about motherhood and her past relationships with Seth’s father and her own mother, S has her own complicated relationships with her mother and an ex-boyfriend who thought she wasn’t enough of an artist for him to take seriously, so he dumped her. When her last big art project failed, she’s decided to take on a new one: to become her mother from the early 1990s and take on the same job: a nanny. S struggles with moving between being Esther, being Kathy (her mother), and being an entirely new person around this family. Kathy is bold, unapologetic, has no fashion sense, has no boundaries, and drinks way too much when she’s not on duty. S also starts a new art project while she’s doing this one, which further spirals her behavior into out of control categories. I really couldn’t relate to S at all. She was of the train wreck variety, with an alcoholic, self-centered mother and a father who thought Esther could do no wrong. It’s amazing that almost no one was hurt with her around.

I give Woman No. 17 a four out of five. The Southern California setting was very beautiful, and I could picture it easily even though I’ve never been there. This book was one that I kept reading and reading, just waiting for all of the different threads to meet and explode. The aftermath wasn’t as bad as I was hoping, but that’s true in real life as well. Most lies came to light, so the ending was satisfying. The novel is really about women and how they can sabotage their relationships with family and friends, and especially how your past shapes you in the future whether you want it to or not. The writing is excellent and I really wanted to see how everyone ended up, even though it featured two women who are just so unhealthily so self-focused, so self-destructive and irresponsible. One was barely an adult and the one that was an adult didn’t act like one until the very end. Ultimately, this is the story of two women who become their mothers: one on accident and one by design.

I had high hopes for this book because I really liked her first book, California. This book turned out pretty well and it seemed promising but I felt like the book was rather anticlimactic and I could not relate to any of the characters. They were all selfish and did not have a set plan in mind. Overall it was well written but I did not feel as though there was a point in this book.

Good book, interesting story, well written. My only issue is that I just didn't understand Esther's motivation. Not for a minute. Loads of unlikable characters here which is fine by me but not everyone's cup of tea.

Maybe more comments after the book as settled into my brain a bit more. (Update: This one has stayed with me more than I expected it to but I still don't understand Esther.)

Nothing like her first book, this is a layered story of the entwined lives of the nanny, the mother, and the teenage son.

Woman No. 17 was not at all what I expected. It was described in the publisher’s blurb as “sinister, sexy noir about art, motherhood, and the intensity of female friendships, set in the posh hills above Los Angeles.” Unfortunately, I didn’t get the “sinister, sexy noir” vibe and the art piece struck me as ridiculous (though, I’m admittedly not an art person).

It’s hard for me to really pin down what this story is about…there are multiple storylines, which felt muddled to me. Is it about Lady navigating her newly separated status? Her friendship with S? Her relationship with her children, particularly her teenage son? S’s oddball art project? S’s relationship with her parents? I have no idea! The most compelling story for me was Lady’s relationship with her teenage son, Seth, and I think I would have been happier had the book focused just on that. Or, at least been described in the blurb as a story about a mother and her son rather than a story about “female friendship.” Seth himself is a multi-faceted, engaging character that (possibly inadvertently) carried the book in my view. Sadly, it wasn’t enough for an overall win.

This book follows Lady, a mother of two living in California, right around the time that she decides to take a break from her adoring husband. She is keeping in multiple secrets and mainly just wants a friend to share her life and experiences with. She puts an ad out for a nanny and that’s when we meet S, an artist who may just possibly be working on the biggest exhibit of her life. The story switches between Lady and S’s perspectives and since they are both a bit eccentric it makes for an entertaining read. There’s lots of odd and questionable things that happen in this book, but it made for an unpredictable read which I think is pretty uncommon these days.

3.5 stars

I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

There was something interesting and different about this book that was refreshing to me. The characters felt new and different - none of them were necessarily likable or unlikeable. The book is told from both Esther and Lady's perspective. I would have also liked a peek inside Seth's mind, but I suppose there's a reason why we don't have one. The relationship between the two female protagonists was interesting to me - it's a dynamic not often explored - and I guess a rather uncommon relationship.

Despite how interesting it was, I did remained detached from the characters. Maybe because the story was so unique that it bordered on unrealistic? I'm not sure. However, I would recommend for anyone looking for a change of pace.

Woman No. 17 is an off kilter, different look at mothers and daughters, with two main characters at different stages of life.

I identified with both women. Both trying to figure out the lives of their mothers, trying to figure out what happened in their own lives.

Although Lady, the older main character, is very flawed and selfish, but I understood her up to a point. Being a mother is hard, and, when you're child is young, it takes over your whole identity. Lady, though, never really takes the time as an adult to find an identity, and, in writing her memoirs, she remembers her favorite version of herself.

S, the younger woman, is different but similar. Young enough to still have time to find herself, she decides to take the time to decode her mother. S finds that it's not so easy, and learns a lesson that took me YEARS to learn: the woman you know as mother is so much more. The flaws we grew up with and remember in our mothers are only part of who they are and were. They had whole lives before us -- and sometimes being a mother is hard and difficult, isolating and lonely.

Sometimes it's hard to know if you're making mistakes as a mother. Usually you're winging it, hoping for the best. You never know if you made the right decisions until your child is older, and then it's too late.

So, although both Lady and S are incredibly flawed and making mistakes at nearly every turn, I understood them. I still wanted to shake them, but I was sympathetic.

Woman No. 17 is a book meant for book discussions, and is perfect for book clubs (or at least my book club). It's one of those stories that causes different reactions depending on the reader, making it perfect for loud, rowdy book debates -- the best kind!

I took some time to gather my thoughts and still can't put words together for this one. It felt desperate, needy. The characters were uncomfortable and unsympathetic. Having said that... I read all the way through. I was waiting to understand... and I don't think I ever did. It wasn't a bad book, wasn't poorly written, it just didn't do anything for me.

What we have here is a book comprised of characters you will dislike intensely. Well, three of them, anyway.

Lady fancies herself a writer, even though it appears that all she’s written is a blog post or two. That led to a book contract for her to write a memoir, but she is plagued by chronic writer’s block. In an attempt to give herself some unencumbered writing time, she hires a nanny named S (yes, S, as in snake – a distinction drawn first by Lady’s three-year-old son Devin) to watch her toddler. Lady has an eighteen-year-old son, Seth, a kid who will not talk He has never spoken a word. He can make sounds, but he can’t – or won’t – talk. He communicates through his own form of sign language, through traditional sign language, and by typing on his phone.

Anyway. Back to Lady and S. Let’s pause for a moment and observe the preciousness of those names. They are almost distracting. Lady’s real name is Pearl, but no one calls her Pearl because she acted like a “lady” when she was a little girl. You can accept this, right? This doesn’t seem too cute, does it? Wait till you get to S Fowler, nee Esther Shapiro. S names herself because she is trying an experiment: a would-be artist, S wants to pretend to be her alcoholic mother. So S reacts to everything as her mother would. Even when she interviews with Lady, S resolutely sticks to her mother’s persona.

So Lady hires S without checking her references. Fortunately, Lady’s estranged husband has a bit more sense and looks into S. Lady places far too big a premium on S’s plain appearance rather than paying attention to the fact that this recent college graduate is in very close age proximity to Seth.

And then there is Kit, Lady’s sister-in-law, a famous photographer who needs a new project. Several years ago, she took Lady’s photo for a series, titling it Woman No. 17. I’m sure this photo is supposed to symbolize something, but I couldn’t tell you what it is. Kit is insufferable.

Edan Lupicki builds some tension around Lady and S, making you wonder if their perfidy will be detected. Both of them are wholly unlikable. Lady has a strange sense of entitlement, and S is an opportunist. They will do things that make you roll your eyes, and not once will you empathize with either of them. A just ending for this book would be for the two of them to be roommates in a seedy two-bedroom apartment in Bakersfield.

Thankfully, the men in the book elevate the story. Why doesn’t Seth talk? The bigger question is if it matters or not. Lady looks at his mutism as commentary about her parenting skills, always eager to place blame. In fact, Seth is an observant, intelligent, sensitive kid. Lady’s husband is a good guy – too good for her by far. Another good guy is S’s father; again, he’s too good for the women in his life.

Sometimes when reading this book, I was at a loss as to the point of some of this. S’s sociological experiment regarding her mother feels so contrived as to leave you incredulous, as does Lady’s approach to parenting and marriage. The pacing is uneven, with some lapses causing your mind to wander.

And yet I couldn’t put it down. So that tells you something, doesn’t it? Lepucki invested me in this book, making me care about Seth, Devin, and Lady’s husband. Lady and S? Not so much.

Some people are good at attracting misery. Reading Lady and S story is like watching a disaster between your fingers: you don't want to look but you can't help yourself.

Thanks to NetGalley for the e-copy of this book.

This was a book that I was very excited about because I saw it everywhere. Big hype. Well sadly I will say it wasn't what I hoped

WOMAN NO. 17 pushes the limits of identity as well as exploring what happens when someone tries to be someone else. Filled with secrets, lies, and duplicity, this book is highly complex story that reads like your favorite trashy beach read. The author manages to weave together extremely developed and complicated issues with such a fluid narrative that it was not until the end that I realized how amazing this book actually is.

While I was reading, I got so caught up in the drama that I didn’t even process the all the layers of S, Lady, and the story until I finished. Then, on top of everything else, there is the pursuit of S’s artistic vision. It shows a deeply flawed girl looking for something through this art project she has committed to. WOMAN NO. 17 is a must read for anyone who loves a darker read about a family that is so far from perfect you can’t help but be pulled into their world.