I started with The Country Life and was delightfully engaged by the crisp, clear, energetic writing, the intriguing story and sympathetic characterizations. I've been looking for another hit of the same from Cusk ever since; unfortunately, although I have tried three other of her books (The Lucky Ones, In the Fold and her nonfiction account of maternity, A Life's Work) I have not been similarly drawn in. In The Fold seems almost defiantly oblique about revealing its characters, and I found A Life's Work downright offensive. (That may be more of an ideological objection than a literary one, however.) The Lucky Ones is so schematically laid out that its characters are all but crushed under the weight of the author's plans for them. I haven't given up though--I really liked The Country Life a lot.