Other Women

Jill Didur teaches English at York University.

This novel explores the emotional maze women stumble through in their
relationships with married men. Raymond, a middle-aged married man, is
having an affair with Fiona, a 24-year-old visual artist. After the
affair ends, Fiona becomes consumed by feelings of self-loathing. In
Fiona’s imagination, Raymond’s wife becomes the embodiment of all
the positive qualities Fiona thinks she lacks.

Although at times beautifully rendered, Fiona’s obsession with the
failed affair becomes tedious. It is difficult to empathize with a
character who claims that her clandestine encounters with a man as
boring as Raymond “were the happiest times of my life.”