The Secret Ingredient
Reviews • Inspiration • Read the First Chapter
Every woman who's ever been involved with a man has harbored the thought: If only he would change. It's just the way we're wired, just the way we look at love. We're deliriously happy with him at the beginning of the romantic relationship, but then, ever so gradually, ever so scarily, we decide he needs to be fixed. But what if we get our wish and we do fix him? And what if it turns out that we were better off with the guy he was before we fixed him?
Meet Elizabeth Baskin, who falls in love, gets married, and discovers six years into her union that the magic is gone - or, rather, fading. Her husband, Roger, has grown a paunch, lost interest in sex, and seems allergic to conversation. What's a disgruntled wife to do? She could go into denial. She could drag him into therapy. Or she could take her sister's advice and consult a certain Beverly Hills doctor who is spoken about in hushed, reverent tones - a doctor to Hollywood stars whose practice is, well, a bit unconventional. After scoring an appointment with the doc, Elizabeth is convinced that she's found the secret ingredient to saving her marriage. It seems so simple, so innocent. All she has to do is slip the prescribed packet of miracle herbs into Roger's orange juice and then - presto! - she'll have him back the way he was before he started coming home from work and falling asleep in front of the television set!
Little does she know that her plan will go dramatically awry and that, instead of rekindling her romance with Roger, she will find herself stuck with a man she hardly recognizes and doesn't even like. Suddenly, Elizabeth is breaking into the doctor's office, running from the law, and teaming up with a transplanted Southern belle, all in a desperate attempt to restore Roger to his old, imperfect self. What she learns is that perfection - especially when it comes to husbands - is highly overrated. The question is: Does her revelation come too late? Filled with Jane Heller's keen observations about relationships and her trademark sense of humor, The Secret Ingredient is another delicious novel of romance, suspense, and laughter.
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Woman's Own
May, 2002
Jane Heller's riotous novel proves the maxim, "Be careful what you wish for." Six years after saying, "I do," Elizabeth Baskin discovers that her sexy soulmate Roger has become a self-absorbed, pot-bellied, passionless slob. Her solution: slipping him a magic herbal potion guaranteed by a Beverly Hills doctor to turn Roger back into Prince Charming. The potion works too well: Roger not only wants her, but every other woman to cross his path. The Secret Ingredient is hilarious, but also ruefully dead-on in depicting the dangers of not appreciating one's mate - warts and all.
Houston Chronicle
February 17, 2002
Jane Heller brings screwball comedy to the page in The Secret Ingredient. Her heroine, Elizabeth Baskin, is long on dreams and short on common sense, a classic combination for mistakes that generally come out all right in the end. A knight in shining armor (or shining auto) rescues Elizabeth from an overheated car during rush hour and proceeds to propose a happily-ever-after life in the luxury of Santa Monica. But Elizabeth finds that marriage and romance aren't always compatriots and that life with Roger has slid into stasis. Rather than adjust her expectations, Elizabeth determines to adjust Roger. Enter the Hollywood witch doctor, with his eponymous secret ingredient to be mixed discreetly into Roger's morning orange juice. Elizabeth forks over the cash for a triple dose - in case Roger needs the high-octane eye of newt - and gets ready for the miracle. A few impatient days later, she and Clover - they met in the purported doctor's waiting room, seeking the same solution to the problem of uninterested husbands - decide what the heck and administer the other two doses to their unsuspecting beloveds. Tampering with Mother Nature and flaunting instructions give Elizabeth and Clover far more than they bargained for in the spousal libido realm. When they dash back to Hollywood for the antidote and find the good shaman is on the lam, they turn to crime, cross-country chases, bribery and tears to get back the husbands they had so wanted to change. Of course, there's no going back, but after a little kidnapping and soul-searching, Elizabeth learns that going forward with a new expectation for happily ever after is far more effective than any potion. Heller's novel is a quick and amusing read, her characters engaging...."
People Newspapers (Dallas)
February 14, 2002
The Secret Ingredient explores the critical time in a relationship when things get stale and a partner begins to look for some ingredient to re-ignite the passions. Heller's heroine finds a secret herb that guarantees her husband will be transformed into his previously sexy self; but the potion goes awry, leaving her with an over-the-top man she didn't plan for and leading her to the realization that she loved the flawed man she married
The Dallas Morning News
February 11, 2002
Romance would be so much easier if we could just fix our partners, now wouldn't it? That's the emotionally risky premise behind Jane Heller's latest romantic comedy, The Secret Ingredient. The supremely talented Ms. Heller delivers snappy wit, lush romance and plenty of surprises in the story of Elizabeth Baskin, an unhappy wife who calls on the "stud stimulant" offered by a Beverly Hills doctor to help save her stuck-in-a-rut marriage. The magic potion doesn't bring exactly the results that Elizabeth had in mind, of course. Readers will be delighted at the saga of the hapless Elizabeth and her magically "transformed" hubby. Just the thing to spark a romantic adventure of your own.
New and Used Books.Com
February 5, 2002
When she married her spouse Roger six years ago, Elizabeth Baskin thought he was an eleven in a male ranking system that tops out at ten. As an undercover field agent for luxurious properties, she seeks perfection in the hotels she clandestinely canvases. Elizabeth expects the same in her personal life. Thus, she decides she must renovate her heavier and lazier real estate attorney spouse so that instead of him sleeping away the night....they make love. Elizabeth knows she needs professional help to accomplish her agenda. She visits Dr. Gordon Farkus, a Beverly Hills "life enhancement" guru. Gordon persuades Elizabeth to buy an herb that magically changes an aging, over-the-hill dud into a lovemaking stud. However, Elizabeth puts too much of the elixir in Roger's orange juice. Instead of lovingly turning to her, he becomes a narcissistic babe magnet. Desperate to regain her husband, the sloth, Elizabeth seeks a cure for the cure. The Secret Ingredient is a humorous contemporary tale with messages on perfection and satisfaction....Jane Heller shows she continues as one of the top satirical humorists with this enjoyable frolic.
Romantic Times Magazine
February, 2002
Like many women before her, Elizabeth Baskin suddenly finds herself worrying that the romance is going out of her marriage. For six years she and Roger were happy. Recently, it seems as if the joy and magic are slipping away. As an undercover inspector of luxury hotels, Elizabeth is used to searching for perfection. Unfortunately, Elizabeth makes a fatal mistake and tries to "fix" her unsuspecting husband Roger. Through her celebrity reporter sister, Elizabeth learns about an exclusive doctor who claims to be a specialist in "life enhancement." Dr. Gordon Farkus, guru to the stars, can address the problem areas of one's life and fix them with a special formula. Desperate, Elizabeth makes an appointment to "enhance" Roger in order to save her marriage. While in the waiting room, Elizabeth meets another wife, Clover Hinsdale. They decide to keep in touch to monitor the progress of their husbands. Elizabeth and Clover give their unsuspecting husbands the specialized potions only to rediscover the old saying...Be careful what you wish for! The wit and irony contained in the novels of Jane Heller is a true joy to behold. No one can take an everyday situation and turn it on its ear quite like she. If you've never tried a Jane Heller book, you are missing out on some of the most delightful, satirical and just plain fun books around.
Publishers Weekly
December 10, 2001
Frothy as a double latte with extra foam, Heller's latest romantic satire (after Female Intelligence) playfully follows the misadventures of Elizabeth Baskin, a dissatisfied wife searching for a magic potion to revitalize her husband, Roger, only to discover that quick fixes can be disastrous. She's a finicky hotel field inspector spy for AMLP, America's Most Luxurious Properties, who's almost ready to downgrade her own marriage as uninhabitable. Roger, an overworked real estate lawyer, has developed a paunch, a bald spot and a penchant for going to bed at 11 instead of making love till dawn. He drools and drops crumbs everywhere when he eats, and she yearns for the old romance of their first meeting when he rescued her from a breakdown on the "dreaded 405," a Southern California freeway. Brenda, who's Elizabeth's well-meaning sister and a celebrity-obsessed journalist, suggests Dr. Gordon Farkus, a Beverly Hills "specialist in life enhancement." Elizabeth buys into the trendy hocus-pocus and purchases a "stud stimulant" to drop into her hubby's fresh-squeezed orange juice, but in her eagerness to rev up Roger, she overdoses him and suddenly her sweet but dull husband becomes a sexy but terribly self-absorbed hunk no woman can resist. Mortified by the havoc she's wrought, Elizabeth decides to ask for the antidote, only to discover the notorious "life-enhancer" has split town. Featuring fun-filled shenanigans played out against L.A. area and resort backdrops, not to mention some rugged adventures on nearby Mt. Baldy, the novel zips along like the latest issue of People and packs the punch of a big bite of pink cotton candy - good for a sticky smile on a lazy afternoon.
I had just finished writing Female Intelligence and was casting about for an idea for my next book. During a phone conversation with my friend, novelist Ruth Harris, she mentioned that her husband drove her crazy by leaving a sticky ring of orange juice on the counter every morning, simply because he always filled his glass too high and it overflowed and it never occurred to him to wipe up the mess. I countered by complaining about my husband's propensity for littering the kitchen floor with English Muffin seeds, not to mention for leaving black smudge marks everywhere after reading the newspaper. That provoked a torrent of wicked giggles from each of us. It also unleashed confessional after confessional about how our husbands, lovable though they are, were no longer the tidy, well groomed stud muffins they'd been when we married them -- or at least that's how it often seemed to us. After we hung up the phone, I started thinking how true it is that the beginnings of relationships are so exciting, so thrilling. Each partner is on his or her best behavior. Each partner is dying to have meaningful conversations, have free time to spend together, have sex -- and then all of a sudden the beginnings are over and the day-to-day routine kicks in. Where's the romance? Where's the communication? Where's the lovemaking? I decided I wanted to write a novel about a wife who experiences the realization that the initial magic of her marriage is gone and that her husband doesn't seem to notice or care. I wanted to write about what happens after that delicious beginning period in a relationship slides into the stale middle period. I wanted to create a heroine who goes to any length to recapture that magic -- even if it means fooling Mother Nature. The result is The Secret Ingredient. I think women everywhere will relate to Elizabeth Baskin's tale. I know my friend Ruth and I do!
