The Spa Decameron - Hardcover

Weldon is sharp; she writes with precision and acuity. There are some seriously funny incidents in The Spa Decameron. Better still, there is some very cunning writing - Spectator magazine (Spectator magazine)

witty and compassionate novel . intriguing stories - Bella Magazine (Bella magazine)

Weldon, as always, produces sparkling dialogue suffused with wit and mischief...She successfully differentiates the voices of each of her protagonists, particularly the transsexual judge, who has been able to experience life from both sides of the sex divide, and the hilariously neurotic screenwriter - Glasgow Herald (Glasgow Herald)

Fay Weldon has ingeniously and deliciously brought (the Decameron) up to date by writing her own ten satires and sexy stories...Weldon describes magnificently the irritations which beset these pampered, impractical ladies...It's intimate, sexy, provocative and frequently very funny. Just the thing to take with you on your Christmas break - Northern Echo (Northern Echo)

Weldon's style, that virtuoso of intelligence and insinuating garrulousness, achieves a kind of ideal equilibrium between therapy and gossip - The Times (The Times)

Ten high achieving ladies are gathered together in the week between Christmas and the New Year, at the expensive Castle Spa, seeking, through Botox, aromatherapy and general all round pampering, a new beginning to their lives. The Ladies lounge around in the Jacuzzi, drinking champagne and eating chocolate telling each other the stories of their lives. Starting with the Trophy wife's tale: her spell in a Greek prison has left her in serious need of a makeover; the Brain Surgeon's tale: of twins and mistaken identity; the Judge's tale: of the sex change which allowed him to judge the pleasures of the bedchamber from both male and female perspectives. The manicurist, the public speaker, the journalist, the company director, the ex vicar's wife, the screenwriter, all share their stories, ending with the stepmother's tale, a reversal of Cinderella's fate, with the stepmother as victim...Sparkling, witty, always compassionate and occasionally libidinous, Fay Weldon's new novel recalls Boccaccio's late medieval masterwork, "The Decameron". Boccaccio dedicated his book to the ladies of his time, who were forced to hide their amorous passions under a veil of discretion, while men were free to indulge theirs.