i finally finished the book, after the two weeks it has been sitting on my bedside table.. :P
the thing about this book is that it has "God's" perspective (God the Creator of all things that are, is, and will be); in between chapters, there's a page where 'God' is explaining what's happening and why it's happening.
on the story: So Sara found out about the affair and dumped Tom and gets kicked out of the house, Tom is heartbroken and runs to George who comforts him for a while. Then George dumped Tom and when Tom asked if she ever loved him, she says "No. I think i just loved the idea of you." BIG OUCH. Then Tom becomes miserable and tries to crawl back to Sara and ask for her forgiveness (with a huge public apology,limousine,fudge,musicians, and tickets to Venice), to no avail. Then, the book skips AFTER TWO YEARS (i always thought this only happened to movies and tv). They've all moved on, Tom meets Sara at a party and gives her a ride home, gives this whole speech about how sorry he was and about unfaithfulness and its repercussions. Sara appears to be quite moved, says NO for the nth time, pushes Tom out the door.
and then 'God' butts in and says in the 2nd to the last page. "I made it involve all your senses: now I'm giving you that extra sense, the one that can hopefully take the edge off it all... a sense of perspective."
and on the last page, Sara opens the door and finds Tom STILL there.
TOM: "They always come back, don't they? In the movies you like? The men always try one more time after it seems it's too late."
SARA: "Aye.. and can I point out that your success rate from copying what works in the movies has been - historically - fvcking tragic?"
T: "Abysmal."
S: "And that 'winningly persistent suitor' or 'creepy bleeding stalker' is not a call that you get to make?"
T: "No - you get to make that call."
S: "Aye, that's right.. That's right: I get to make that call."
T: "So?"
* personally i think Tom killed the whole speech by starting with, "Here's the thing about being unfaithful, Sara .. it's absolutely FANTASTIC." Although he tried recover from this point on and made good arguments, if this was said to me, i would always look back to him saying 'Being unfaithful is Fantastic' with a capital F