Product Description

"Now we're just alike." So begins Fiona and Patricia's friendship that warm autumn morning in first grade in Lake Charles, Louisiana, their bond forged ever closer by Fiona's abusive mother and Patricia's neglectful one. Their relationship is a source of continuity and strength through their move to L.A. to become actresses; through Fiona's marriage and Patricia's sudden fame. When husband and career pressures exact a toll, the women wonder if their friendship can survive. Then a dark secret from their past emerges, threatening to destroy not only their bond, but all they've worked for as well.

The Safety of Secrets is a beautifully written exploration of the bonds forged in childhood and challenged decades later, of the fulfillment of dreams and the damage they can cause, and of secrets being uncovered and the truth we find inside.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #93934 in Books
• Published on: 2008-06-01
• Released on: 2008-05-27
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 320 pages

From Booklist
Michel’s follow-up to Aftermath of Dreaming (2006) is the tale of two childhood best friends who fled their Louisiana roots for Los Angeles. Fiona is a moderately successful, married actress who has just learned she is expecting a child. Patricia is the one with the superstar career: as the host of a sports reality show, she is a high-profile celebrity, as is her new husband, Zane, a dashing but shallow movie star. Fiona feels a disconnect with Patricia after Patricia’s impulsive marriage to Zane in Las Vegas, and it’s further emphasized by her mixed feelings upon learning the sex of her baby, feelings she feels she can’t share with Patricia. When Patricia commits a startling betrayal and reveals a secret the two have been keeping since their teens, Fiona realizes their longtime friendship is at a crossroads and may not survive. Michel is deeply attuned to the subtleties in women’s friendships, the little nuances that indicate a slight or an attempt at making up for one, and she pays tribute to them with this layered, fluid novel. --Kristine Huntley

Review
"At once funny, moving, and richly evocative of contemporary Los Angeles, The Safety of Secrets more than confirms its promise." -- Peter Biskind, best-selling author of Easy Riders, Raging Bulls: How the Sex-Drugs-and-Rock 'N' Roll Generation Saved Hollywood

"DeLauné Michel has written a terrifically funny book with a very tender heart. It manages to be wonderfully confessional and psychologically mysterious. The Safety of Secrets is the perfect curl-up-on-the-couch-and-read-all-day-long kind of book. It stays with you." -- Jill A. Davis, Author of Ask Again Later & Girls' Poker Night

"The Safety of Secrets is a funny, keenly observed, deeply moving story of coming of age too soon. DeLauné Michel’s elegantly structured novel jumps back and forth between an imperfect childhood in Louisiana, and a complicated adulthood in Los Angeles. ." -- Warren Leight, Tony-award winning playwright of Side Man

"a beautifully written book that takes you into the mind of a woman attempting the impossible; trying to make marriage, motherhood, friendship and a career as an actress all work in the gladiatorial ring of Los Angeles. DeLauné Michel writes with the precision and insight of an x-ray." -- Merrill Markoe, New York Times best-selling author

Funny and touching, this is a tale of childhood--and how it never ends. -- Cathleen Schine, New York Times bestselling author of THE NEW YORKERS

Written with tremendous narrative velocity, The Safety of Secrets is almost impossible to put down. -- Dani Shapiro, award-winning, best-selling writer

Review
"a beautifully written book that takes you into the mind of a woman attempting the impossible; trying to make marriage, motherhood, friendship and a career as an actress all work in the gladiatorial ring of Los Angeles. DeLaun Michel writes with the precision and insight of an x-ray." (Merrill Markoe, New York Times best-selling author )

"DeLaun Michel has written a terrifically funny book with a very tender heart. It manages to be wonderfully confessional and psychologically mysterious. The Safety of Secrets is the perfect curl-up-on-the-couch-and-read-all-day-long kind of book. It stays with you." (Jill A. Davis, Author of Ask Again Later & Girls' Poker Night )

Funny and touching, this is a tale of childhood--and how it never ends. (Cathleen Schine, New York Times bestselling author of THE NEW YORKERS )

"At once funny, moving, and richly evocative of contemporary Los Angeles, The Safety of Secrets more than confirms its promise." (Peter Biskind, best-selling author of Easy Riders, Raging Bulls: How the Sex-Drugs-and-Rock 'N' Roll Generation Saved Hollywood )

Written with tremendous narrative velocity, The Safety of Secrets is almost impossible to put down. (Dani Shapiro, award-winning, best-selling writer )

"The Safety of Secrets is a funny, keenly observed, deeply moving story of coming of age too soon. DeLaun Michel's elegantly structured novel jumps back and forth between an imperfect childhood in Louisiana, and a complicated adulthood in Los Angeles. ." (Warren Leight, Tony-award winning playwright of Side Man )

Customer Reviews

Loyalty and Friendship Grow Up
In the same vein as Firefly Lane and Beaches, THE SAFETY OF SECRETS is a true to life story of the enduring friendship of two women. It tells how their childhood bond is tested as they mature and their values and loyalties are formed and lives change.

Fiona and Patricia meet in first grade in Louisiana and their family lifestyles are different as Fiona comes from a "normal" family with two parents and a sister, while Patricia is raised by a single mother who has an older son from a previous marriage. Both of the girls' youth is greatly influenced by their mothers with Fiona's mother being abusive, while Patricia's mom neglects her. The girls experience a trauma young in their lives and they agree to keep it a secret for life.

Fiona and Patricia grow up and both pursue acting careers, and they are both successful in their own way. However, Fiona marries and has a baby while having a moderately successful and steady television career compared to Patricia's wild celebrity life filled with all the bells and whistles the paparazzi is crazy for.

The chapters alternate between the past as children and their current lives as adults, and thus the story slowly unfolds little by little until the "secret" that is alluded to finally is revealed. However, the way it happens is what brings us to the climax of the story and forces Fiona and Patricia to face the truth of that secret and the ramifications it has played in their lives for years. Fiona comes to realize how much the secret and her mother intertwined to make her the person she is today. Will Fiona's and Patricia's friendship be able to endure this explosive revelation? How will this affect their current relationships and especially the ones with their mothers?

The Safety of Secrets is relatable and one that will have the reader taking sides and staying glued to the story until the end to find out what the secret is. The reader will want to find out what the secret does to Fiona's and Patricia's adult lives and those they now care about. I found the story to be an interesting, well written, believable tale of two women and their friendship.

Read it!
Can't-put-it-down readable with a secret at its core, this book is a sensitive, canny portrayal of a decades-long friendship. It works as a great beach read because of Michel's funny insights into the Hollywood actors scene, but like an iceberg, it has unexpected solidity under the surface. It's depth snuck up on me. It's an atypical coming-of-age story in that rather than simply covering the familiar territory of the jump from girl-to-woman; it explores the maturity that is required to jump from young-woman-to-mother. The crisis in the main character Fiona's relationship with her childhood friend Patricia, coming at the same time as the birth of Fiona's first child, enables Fiona to step into her true female adulthood--to access the maturity required to be a stable and loving example to her baby. Having witnessed Fiona's journey into unconditional love and forgiveness, we are assured that her child will be protected from at least some of the pain and tragedy that Patricia and Fiona endured. I loved it from the beginning to the sweet and moving last page. Read it!

dangerous faultlines
Maybe it's because I'm in the midst of deciding what to do about one of my own old relationships that this book hit me so hard. Like Fiona in the book, I'm struggling with a friendship that has emerged as a two-headed hydra--and that's what Michel gets at so trenchantly: just how difficult it is to maintain a long-standing friendship and to keep that monster the ego from taking over and sucking every bit of air out of the garden. Oh, and the mother is quite a piece of work, too.

Michel is a pull-no-punches kind of writer with a terrific way with a metaphor. SAFETY OF SECRETS reads like a thriller, the pacing is so taut, and in fact there is a very real crime committed within its pages. In Michel's hands this scene is both subtle and crushing. A lessor writer would have yielded to its prurient potential; Michel instead reveals her power to pull us deep into the character's feelings. A compelling read.