In 1961, on the day that Yuri Gagarin becomes the first human in outer space, Edith meets her glamorous new neighbour Frankie Frankie. The two housewives become firm friends, and when Frankie's domineering husband Ralph refuses to let her get a job, Edith hatches a plan: she'll keep her friend's household running while Frankie secretly goes out to work. And so Edith become Frankie's secret wife: dusting cleaning and cooking her way through the sexual revolution, the summer of love and the second wave of feminism. But how long can a relationship last when it's based on secrecy and deception? The Secret Wife is an irresistible story of fierce love, unconditional sacrifice and the transcendent power of pulling together