Take the good old series Desperate Housewives down a couple of notches, and you have a good idea of the characters contained in Cul-de-sac. When a tentative friendliness develops between all of these neighbors, it results in an explosive night of What The Heck.

There are many characters in this book, mostly because each family living on the cul-de-sac is featured separately then as they interact. It’s hard to keep straight at first. I had to re-read some portions to try to remember who was who. As I got further into the book, though, it was easier to distinguish between characters.

The character growth and development is decent, especially for such a character-heavy novel. There are several graphic violent scenes — especially containing domestic violence and sexual assault — so be warned about the content.

This was my first time reading a Joy Fielding novel. In the author’s note she mentioned that this was her 29th novel, so I have a lot of reading to catch up on!

Thanks to Netgalley and Random House Ballantine for providing me with a copy of this book. Opinions shared are mine.