By Faith Simpson | CONTRIBUTING WRITER

In a world where Pinterest-perfect kitchens and submissive smiles are sold as the ultimate prize, Waiting For Ted by Marieke Bigg rips the curtain back on the glossy lie of the “trad wife” fantasy. So many modern marriages are crumbling beneath the weight of outdated ideals repackaged by empowerment – where women are expected to sacrifice their identities, ambitions, and emotional needs in service of a dream that was never truly theirs. Bigg doesn’t just tell a narrative; she exposes a quiet, daily crack – the kind that happens when a woman waits too long for a man who was never really coming.

The novel centers on Rosie, a woman in her forties who has spent years molding herself into the ideal partner, tethered to the fantasy of domestic bliss. When her husband, Ted, abruptly disappears, Rosie doesn’t spiral – she waits. She cooks his meals, preserves their home like a shrine, and convinces herself his return is inevitable. But as days stretch into a surreal stasis, the novel peels back layers of Rosie’s psyche, revealing that Ted’s vanishing act only made visible a deeper absence – one that had been hollowing her life long before he left. Through dreamlike fragments and a chillingly quiet descent into obsession, Bigg weaves a tale not of romance, but of identity erasure- and the slow, aching realization that devotion built on silence can become its own kind of prison.

The obsession of the “perfect” housewife

One of the most arresting themes in Waiting For Ted is the cultural obsession with the “perfect” housewife, a role that has shapeshifted from postwar necessity into a strangely glamorous aspiration. From the 1950s ideal of June Cleaver, to the pastel-filtered rise of modern influencers on Tiktok and Instagram romanticizing “slow living” and cottagecore domesticity, the image of the woman who finds meaning in tending, pleasing, and waiting has never fully disappeared – it’s just evolved.

Today’s version wears linen dresses, brews herbal tea, and calls homemaking a form of empowerment, branding submission as self-care. Rosie, the protagonist, slips into this archetype almost religiously. She maintains her home like a living altar, following rituals that mimic the content we see in viral “clean girl” routines or tradwife accounts, where control over one’s environment is mistaken for control over one’s life.

Bigg masterfully shows how Rosie is both trapped by and complicit in this fairy tale, slowly dissolving into the very aesthetic she thought would give her purpose. The novel challenges us to ask: when devotion becomes performance, who is the audience, and what happens when they stop clapping?

Rosie’s unraveling in the novel reflects the whispered rebellion seen in shows like The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives, where women once committed entirely to patriarchal traditions begin to question and ultimately reject the systems that kept them obedient. Both portrayals reveal how a woman’s identity can be swallowed whole by a set of cultural expectations: keep sweet, serve silently, don’t question authority. For Rosie, it’s the housewife ideal. She molds herself into the perfect partner, a living statue in a perfectly arranged home, all in service of a man who isn’t even there. For the Mormon wives, it’s the lifelong submission to a religious structure that glorifies male leadership and family duty as sacred. In both cases, the women are promised a purpose if they follow the script. But eventually, something snaps. The illusion cracks. These women begin to carve out autonomy, not always loudly, but defiantly. Rosie’s downfall into fascination becomes its own kind of resistance, a refusal to move on or behave “appropriately.” Likewise, the Mormon wives begin stepping outside their assigned roles, seeking education, careers, or simply the right to interrogate. Both narratives show how rebellion doesn’t always look like revolution, sometimes it looks like waking up in the same house you’ve always kept perfect and realizing you want to leave it behind.

Unspoken expectations of womanhood

What struck me most while reading this novel was Bigg’s distinct and imaginative style. Her writing doesn’t follow the typical plan – it’s layered, inventive, and brimming with  metaphors that give everyday emotions a strange, almost holy texture. Instead of simply telling Rosie’s story, Bigg filters it through objects, memories, and symbolism that feel both tender and unsettling. One of the most powerful images in the novel is Rosie’s comparison of the people in her life to canopic jars – ancient vessels once used in Egyptian burial practices to hold organs. Each jar is tied to a different figure in her past, whether nurturing or harmful, as if she’s preserving their influence in sealed glass, not letting them go but not quite living with them either. And then there’s the repeated line at the beginning of every chapter: “I’m waiting for Ted to come home.” It reads almost like a spell, a refrain that traps the reader in her delusion while softly hinting at her undoing. The deeper I got into the book, the more it felt like I had wandered into an alternate reality – something surreal and disorienting, like watching an old episode of The Twilight Zone where time stretches thin and nothing ever quite settles into place. Bigg’s prose doesn’t just convey passion, it builds an atmosphere that lingers.

This is a novel that will resonate completely with a lot of women, especially those here in Lynchburg where tradition still carries weight and expectations around womanhood often go unspoken. Whether you’re a stay-at-home mother holding your household together, or an up-and-coming “tradwife” content creator carefully crafting your lifestyle online, Waiting For Ted speaks directly to that experience. It explores the emotional cost of constantly showing up, of putting others first, and of molding yourself to fit into a role that may not reflect who you really are. For any woman who’s married, with kids or without, there’s something strikingly familiar in Rosie’s story: the way small sacrifices pile up, how longing gets buried beneath daily routines, and how easy it is to lose sight of yourself while trying to be everything for someone else. Bigg offers perspective in this novel. It gives readers a chance to look back on their own lives, to question the ideals they’re striving for, and to see that they’re not alone in feeling the heaviness of it all.

Reading Waiting For Ted stirred up a storm of emotions in me, most of them heavy and uncomfortably familiar. I felt unsettled, angry, and heartbroken all at once. There were moments that made my skin crawl, especially watching Rosie convince herself she had found her soulmate, only to realize she was never more than a trophy, something polished to admire until the novelty wore off. It was sickening, in the most sincere way, to witness how easily she was placed on a pedestal and then slowly forgotten, like so many women who are adored for their beauty, charm, or faithfulness until the man gets bored and trades emotional intimacy for golf clubs, man caves, and affairs. That realization hit hard. It simulated a truth many of us try to ignore, that women pour themselves into the people they love, constantly giving, constantly stretching, and yet are often discarded, overlooked, or taken for granted in return. This book required me to sit with those feelings. It made me consider what I want from my own relationship and what I refuse to settle for. It showed me a version of marriage I never want to wake up in, one where you give everything and slowly disappear anyway.

I truly loved this book – every beautifully written, painfully accurate second of it. Marieke Bigg didn’t sugarcoat anything. She captured what it feels like to be in a destructive, failing marriage in a way that was so raw and real, it hit a nerve. Her writing style was just chef’s kiss, smooth and poetic when it needed to be, but also sharp and unfiltered when the truth demanded it. The way she thinks, the way she puts it all on the page, it just flowed like honey, even when what she was saying was hard to swallow. There were moments that honestly made me stop and think about every relationship I’ve ever been in. It made me uncomfortable in the best way. It felt like someone was holding up a mirror and daring you to look. I flew through it, but it stuck with me long after. Hands down, five stars. I’d recommend this to any woman, mainly those who’ve ever questioned where they stand in their marriage or felt like they’ve given too much. This book reminds you what not to settle for.

This was a superbly written warning wrapped in velvet. Let it sit with you. Let it change you.•

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