RATING: 4 OUT OF 5
Meg Waite Clayton has definitely captured the essence of friendship among women and proved that while "blood may be thicker than water" you get to "pick" your friends while you "inherit" your relatives.
We meet Linda, Ally, Kath, Brett and Frankie, the narrator, during 1969 in Palo Alto, California where they are all young married women. All but Ally have children and in fact, that is was attracts Ally to the group in the first place as she observed the others in the park each week with their kids. Slowly, this group of women decide they should meet every week to write. Write for writing's sake, you know, that burning desire to release that one "great book" that each of us has in us. The current events of the time have influence on the course that some of them take, but others are simply curious sideline observers. At one point in the book, I almost left the women in frustration, because this had been a prime time in my life. I was a young woman, not married, but on my own and experiencing first hand many of the issues i.e., Equal Rights for Women, Vietnam, Peace Movement, Racism that they wavered on because of the values that had been instilled in them by their families.
I am glad to say that I hung in there with the "sisters" and they grew, matured, and learned that they could choose a different course than their parents, and the world would not come to an end. The depth of the friendship and bonds that developed for these women was heart wrenching at times, and heartwarming at others. This is a book that can be enjoyed by any generation but it is a wonderful read down memory lane for those of us that came of age during the 60's.
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