What Was She Thinking: Notes on a Scandal?

What Was She Thinking: Notes on a Scandal?
Zoë Heller

I did this backward, and saw the movie first, mostly because I did not know that there was a book. I netflixed the movie and loved it. I think Judi Dench was excellent and the Academy Award was well deserved. She played Barbra, but she added her own uniqueness to it. Usually I don’t like the movie version of books, but this one I enjoyed both almost equally (I’m still a book geek, so I liked the book a little bit better.)

I probably would have never picked up this book without seeing the movie and it is sad that I could have missed out on such a great book. The premise of the story is about a young woman who has an affair with her much younger male student. I’m kind of over that whole scenario with all the double-standards and media attention about that sort of thing but this book is not completely about that. The narrator is Barbara, a much older teacher at St. George’s (the novel is set in London) who takes an interest in the new, younger, prettier Bathsheba (Sheba) Hart. The form a friendship and Barbara takes us on a time line from the moment Sheba arrives, to the beginning of their friendship and everything until when the affair is discovered and the aftermath. The book alternates between the past and present (after the affair is discovered). The best part of the book is that in answers the question in the title- we know exaclty what Sheba was thinking. I think that the answer could only be told be an outsider and someone like Barbara. If it was told by Sheba herself, it would loose the umph of the story/scandal and we would all hate Sheba, but through Barbara- it is a masterpiece.

Barbara is one of my favorite narrators. Her tongue-in-cheek humor and dry sarcasm had me laughing out loud at times and her honesty and writing was superb. This book is worth 5 gold stars.

The movie is good (well of course - that is why it was nominated and won Academy Awards) - but my advice is read the book before the movie. Either way, the book is great.