Product Description
For Kate Klein, a semi-accidental mother of three, suburbia has been full of unpleasant surprises. Her once-loving husband is hardly ever home. The supermommies on the playground routinely snub her. Her days are spent carpooling and enduring endless games of Candy Land, and at night, most of her orgasms are of the do-it-yourself variety.

When a fellow mother is murdered, Kate finds that the unsolved mystery is the most exciting thing to happen in Upchurch, Connecticut, since her neighbors broke ground for a guesthouse and cracked their septic tank. Even though the local police chief warns her that crime-fighting's a job best left to the professionals, Kate launches an unofficial investigation -- from 8:45 to 11:30 on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, when her kids are in nursery school.

As Kate is drawn deeper into the murdered woman's past, she begins to uncover the secrets and lies behind Upchurch's picket-fence facade -- and considers the choices and compromises all modern women make as they navigate between marriage and independence, small towns and big cities, being a mother and having a life of one's own.

Amazon.com Review
Goodnight Nobody is bestselling author Jennifer Weiner's attempt at writing a mystery, with a healthy dose of the author's chick lit sensibilities thrown in for good measure. While this Desperate Housewives meets Sex in the City murder mystery won't make readers shake in their Manolo Blahniks, it will provide the obligatory humor and compassion to which fans of Weiner's Good in Bed, In Her Shoes, and Little Earthquakes have grown accustomed.

Kate Klein is a feisty, charmingly insecure Connecticut housewife who trades in a life of late-night karaoke sing-a-longs and West Village brunches with her best friend Janie for a world of mini-vans and Mommy and Me pilates classes. Life in Upchurch, Connecticut, heats up when Kate discovers picture-perfect wife and mother Kitty Cavanaugh dead on the pickled maple hardwood floor of her recently remodeled kitchen. A former chronicler of celebrity gossip, Kate takes it upon herself to solve the mystery of Kitty's murder and the disappearance of Lexi Hagen-Holdt, another Upchurch supermom. Along the way, the mysteries and disappointments in Kate's personal life begin to unravel, including her marriage to the kind-yet-uptight Ben, and her unresolved crush on Evan McKenna, a former neighbor with whom a one-night tryst ended in disaster. Thrown in for comic relief, and perhaps to show the depth of Weiner's talents as a writer, are Kate's twin boys and adorably sophisticated 5-year old daughter Sophie ("Sophie was sitting on the toilet, applying lipstick and waiting her turn...").

Goodnight Nobody is chock full of plot twists and turns which can be overwhelming and superfluous. However, Weiner's charm and grace are usually enough to rescue readers from these moments of confusion, and reaffirm our commitment to this endearing contemporary voice. --Gisele Toueg

CUSTOMER REVIEWS (Average Customer Rating: 3.0 based on 196 reviews)

I was disappointed

This was the first time I read a novel by Jennifer Weiner. I was expecting a laugh a minute but didn't get it. Sure there was plenty of humorous dialog and funny situations. I did laugh! But I tired of the descriptions of baggy pants and XL sweaters midway through. Kate was defined by her poor fashion sense and her inability to cook. None of the characters had enough guts to them to keep me interested. And the end was so dark and disturbing it made me wonder what the point was.
One Clown Short
August 31, 2008

Loved this Weiner Book!

Wow, I was expecting to see rave reviews for "Goodnight Nobody" and was surprised people didn't find it as fun as I did. This is my favorite JW book so far and I was really hoping she'd decide to write a second book as a follow up. I thought the dialog was crisp and interesting. Loved the cast of characters and the past that kept creeping up on Kate as she tried to solve the mysterious death of her neighbor. It wasn't so much the 'mystery' involved as it was the fact that Kate was using it as a spring-board to change her life. Perhaps I also related to this book as someone that had that career and found herself trying to fit into the 'mommy circle'. I thought Kate's observations of her new neighborhood was spot on. I really didn't want it to end. If you're a Jennifer Weiner fan, I think this is worth a read. If you haven't read one of her books yet, dive in!
August 23, 2008

Author tries to do too much, but made me laugh

Jennifer Weiner tackles multiple genres in Goodnight Nobody. Isolated mother of three Kate Klein is disconcerted to receive her first invitation from one of the model mommies of Upchurch Connecticut, or "Tal-bots" as Kate calls them. Since moving to Upchurch from Manhattan she feels frumpy and incompetent in comparison to the other preschool mothers who are perfectly dressed, always in control, and never let anything that isn't organic pass the lips of their little darlings. When Kate shows up at the home of her prospective friend, she finds the woman stabbed to death in the kitchen.

Kate becomes obsessed with investigating the murder, talking to her friends and family and going back through her past. One of the reasons for the obsession is that Kate and the victim have a man in common: sexy Evan from her single New York days.

Meanwhile, Kate learns the victim had been ghostwriting a column called "The Good Mother" for an outspoken conservative woman personality on the evils of mothers who work or use daycare.

Jennifer Weiner's gift of humor carries the book. Truthfully, Goodnight Nobody (yes, named from America's favorite bedtime story) tries to do too much. It's the saga of a disaffected suburban mom, that's also a murder mystery, with a side dish of feminist novel. The characters of Kate Klein and her crazy best friend from the city, Janey are believable and loveable. The various suburban characters are entertaining, although not particularly three-dimensional. Kate can't see them as three-dimensional either, so that's not a major problem.

I'm not sure what the mother-of-young-children sub-genre of chick lit is called, but Goodnight Nobody is an enjoyable member of it. It's not as good as I Don't Know How She Does It: The Life of Kate Reddy, Working Mother by Allison Pearson, but if you enjoy human drama or murder mysteries, don't live in suburban Connecticut, and have a sense of humor, you will enjoy this book.
June 22, 2008

Wildly uneven...

"Goodnight Nobody" is a page turner and an easy read; I read this 375 page book in one day. The setup is arresting: suburban housewife Kate Klein happens upon a crime scene and soon she's in a mad dash to find the killer. The woman who died is a ghostwriter for a Dr. Laura/Ann Coulter type, and as Kate investigates there are many tantalizing leads and false starts.

Weiner's prose shines at times. To wit: "Sukie and I had been struggling for cordiality ever since the day we'd met, when she'd told me her kids were named Tristan and Isolde, and I'd laughed, thinking she was kidding, and she wasn't." And this: "The Cavanaughs had the same house we did, the Montclaire (six bedrooms, five full baths, hard-wood floors throughout.) The investors in our development were Italian, plenty of the residents were Jewish, and yet the homes had names that made them sound like members of British Parliament."

With a strong setup and good writing, the plot takes off for a while only to glide along and end up with an ending that doesn't satisfy. The resolution is a curious mixture of grand and mundane. Then there's the issue of Kate's marital situation, which ends on a similarly flat note. And the writing itself is wildly uneven too, vacillating from witty observations like the ones above to crass sarcasm ("What does Evan McKenna do?" he asked. "Models." I replied. ) I kept expecting to hear a rim shot.

Not a bad book, but not a great one either.
June 06, 2008

Substitute Writer

The book starts out like any other Jennifer Weiner novel--witty, well written and a joy to read. However, about half way through, it is as if someone else sat down at Weiner's desk and finished the book (and not well, I might add). The storyline just faded away and there was little wittiness in the second half. Very disappointing and I am a fan.
May 19, 2008

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