Rating: 
Summary: Bracing and illuminating
Review: Anyone under 50 who doesn't relate to the issues raised in these essays -- work, marriage, children, and compromise -- is living in a bubble. Don't be put off by the title -- or by the common misrepresentation (like by Katie Couric on the Today Show) that it's the whining of women who seemingly "have it all." The point is, you CAN'T have it all, and have to try to forge happiness anyway. Crack it open and you won't put it down. My favorites include "Atilla the Honey I'm Home" about a woman who is ultra cool and competent at work and then comes home and takes out all her stress on her family. "How We Became Strangers" about the effect the arrival of a first child has on marital bliss. And "Crossing the Line in the Sand" about losing your temper with your kids. The book is organized in rough age order of the contributors, so it starts with women in their twenties just on the cusp of What The Future Holds, and ends with a few in their (60s?) about the roads taken and not. In between you have a wide range of experiences -- fidelity and not, equal parenting and not, successful relationships and not, getting married or not, feeling good about work or not. These aren't easy issues and the book confronts them head-on. The essayists don't provide solutions so much as comfort -- a community of like-minded souls who realize what we're all up against and are trying to make sense of it all.
Rating:
Summary: Elegant confessions
Review: Virginia Woolf had "the angel in the house." Well, Cathi Hanauer (that "I" in Cathi is soo telling in several ways) has the title of this book, and she's lived it. But the title is misleading. This is not so much a collection of estrogen rants as it is a grad school course in Reality Relationships. Let me make you a little promise: if you are a woman between the ages of twenty-something and forty-ish, you will absolutely love this book; and if you are a male you will squirm a little and read as much as you can, and then after some digestion, read the whole thing. And then feel real wise or real dumb, depending. The women here want a whole lot, and it is at first a little off-putting to read about their frustrations with the men who are never, but never, perfect. One wants to say, hey, guess what? Neither are YOU! And one wants to say, it doesn't take the wisdom of Solomon to figure out that you can't always get what you want, or that, for you in particular, and for every other woman in the world, there is no perfect man. In fact, that is what most of the women in this book, writing so articularly, so passionately, so "honestly" (although at least one had to use a pseudonym, and I don't blame her), came to realize, and to take as part and parcel of the inexplicable bitter sweetness of life. Let me give you a clue (not that I am any Solomon myself, but for what it's worth I have been there and done that from the male point of view): one does NOT (as Lucy from Peanuts once expressed it) go from "ups to upper ups" in life. Love and sex and passion and romance are like taking drugs, the more passionate the relationship the harder the fall and the more lasting the pain. The higher the highs, the lower the lows. The more fantastic the sex, the worse the rest is likely to be. Prince Charming only courts Grace Kelly or Jackie O, and believe it, Prince Charming had a fault or two. And yes, life is unfair. You will, nine times out of ten, end up doing more around the house and with the children than he will--even if you make more money than he does. Why is this so? It's not just that men and women are different with different strategies and different needs (although that is true), but because any woman that doesn't do a better job with such things is not an alpha (w)itch to begin with, and certainly is not a woman that most men would want for the long run. The women who really care quite simply do more, and any man worth the discernment knows that. I liked Hanauer's Introduction in which he lays out just how and why this book came to be. I especially love the way she and the women who wrote the twenty-six pieces WRITE. The prose is smart and sharp and knowing, very knowing. For example, after Hazel McClay ("A Man in the Heart") writes "Sooner or later I'll probably be tempted to cheat" she adds, "I'm not looking forward to that time." She has compared the man of her twenties, a man that was passionate and made her passionate, with the man of her thirties, a man she loves who has however "never wrapped me in his arms, never...kissed me until I gasped for breath." Hazel McClay is not her real name. One sees why. But I suspect there will be some women reading this who would like to remind her of the women in Afghanistan and say, lady, you actually had everything, you just didn't have it all at the same time. Nobody does. At least not for long. And there IS a reason that Karen Karbo ("Why I Hate That My Mother Was Right...") married not "horizontally" but "down." And then there is Hope Edelman ("The Myth of Co-Parenting"), who also writes with elegance, complaining about the 92-hour weeks her husband put in. She had won "the boyfriend jackpot. He was beautiful and sexy, and devoted and smart...and he had the kindest green eyes." And then he became a work alcoholic and simply wasn't there. I'm thinking as I'm reading this, hey, get a new clue: 90-hour weeks mean only one thing. But no, there is not a hint of another woman. And then I'm thinking, the guy is afraid. He is scared to death that the passion is going to go or has gone out of his marriage and he is compensating big time. Absence makes the heart grow fonder. And then, when it all gradually goes away and he begins to be home more and Hope Edelman has released "the dream of completely equal co-parenting," and all is, relatively speaking, marital bliss, I want to say, there is something you didn't tell us...! But I need to let that go. This is a fascinating book, a page-turner, filled with sharp observations and melancholy truths from some very bright women who learned those truths, or those partial truths, or those elusive truths, or those truths-in-the-making, the only way they can be learned, that is by living them. And they are very good at sharing. I came away feeling that, the woman in the house, having come home from work to "see a sinkful of dishes" and the man on "the couch, beer in hand, newspaper spread before him, stereo blaring the Dave Matthews Band"--that these two people have learned to live and love and accept the imperfections of one another and of life.
Rating: 
Summary: Don't Spend The Money
Review: While I agree that the essays were well-written and interesting, I have to agree with the reviewer who wrote that this book was annoying and "the women made their bed now lie in it". Maybe because I'm not married and don't have children, I can say that I do not understand their frustrations but this is obviously the path they chose. My advice to the authors is GROW UP!!! Who said life is easy?
Rating: 
Summary: Too much and too little
Review: I was enthralled when I started this book of reflections by female writers on love, marriage, sex, and motherhood but towards the end it did become tiresome, as another reviewer said. It was just more of the same. No one was truly happy giving up the single life for a shared one with a man; the womqn, despite her best intentions, always became "the wife" and an unequal partner. The one woman who had a husband who was truly fully engaged in fatherhood jealously competed with him for the child's attention.
Another failing was that all the women are fairly young with very young children. I wanted to see the same reflection from the perspective of older women whose children are grown and establishing their own lives. I daresay the stories would be quite a bit different when the authors are not so immersed in the experiences about which they are writing.
If I had read this book while still single, I would have found the stories of women feeling so trapped in expectations quite depressing.
Rating:
Summary: These women need good husbands
Review: I found the book to be very well written, laid out in a way that is not jolting from story to story. I found the material to be educating, but far from enlightening. I found that these women are not as smart as I thought they should be, overlooking simple happiness. I found that there is a huge gap or hole in fundamental understanding of love in these women. I found they are looking for things they think make them happy but to their unknown naive dismay will keep looking until their tombstones go up. A very good book about women who are truly shallow in a real world they don't see. The thought of having optimism in an imperfect husband, I found these women cannot grasp or learn. I found that I have never seen a such a group of shallow women in that they do not even wish to acknowledge basic truths of equality. I am pleased I read this book, I really did enjoy it, knowing that I would never allow myself to be self violated from ignorance as these have. I do recommend every woman to read this, so they don't become this weak minded. Although that was not the intent of this book, its authors couldn't even see that, they again were looking in the plastic world. For such women, a book for understanding what a woman needs to avoid to be happy is "Mad Light", by Maddox. But who am I to say, I'm just a happily married working mother who would never dare come near these womens intentions.
Rating:
Summary: A tree gave its life?
Review: A tree gave its life for this book? Give me a break! As a woman, I take offense to others who cannot look at the sunny side of life! This sets women back 100 years.
Rating:
Summary: Don't Spend The Money
Review: While I agree that the essays were well-written and interesting, I have to agree with the reviewer who wrote that this book was annoying and "the women made their bed now lie in it". Maybe because I'm not married and don't have children, I can say that I do not understand their frustrations but this is obviously the path they chose. My advice to the authors is GROW UP!!! Who said life is easy?
Rating: 
Summary: Boring and annoying
Review: I found this book in the trash in front of my ghetto building yesterday. I should have left it there. It was a very tedious and trying read. I felt like smacking some of the dummies I met in the book. Why are they complaining? They are rich, successful, or at least solidly middle class people for the most part. Maybe, after living alone for 20 years (after being widowed and bringing up a son alone) and enjoying my life WITHOUT a mate/partner/spouse, I just can't relate to these women and their relationship "problems". Listen girlies, you made your bed, lie in it and shut up! Also, there were no essays by more down to earth people (poor or lower middle class) with real problems and real lives. Not all of us are inarticulate baboons. You could have found one of us. Please, I wish I could spend half my year writing or doing art in a cabin up in the mountains like one of the essay writers does. What's to complain about? I picked this book up hoping for a free LAUGH, but now I know why the previous owner tossed it in the garbage. It's B-O-R-I-N-G and annoying.
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting and thought-provoking
Review: I thoroughly enjoyed the essays in this book. While the collection may lack balance in some ways because all the contributors are professional writers, there is a good diversity of opinion and life choices here. I strongly disagree with the reviewer who says, "These sad women, scribbling words that hardly anyone will ever read, are actually to be pitied as they are clearly suffering from intense self-loathing." This reviewer calls herself a devout feminist but spends most of her review attacking the choices made by other women. One thing I found interesting in several essays was how the writer came to respect the choices made by her mother, even after struggling for many years not to "become" her mother. The anthology suggests, on the whole, that no single path is right or leads to complete happiness. Strong women accept the consequences of their imperfect choices and soldier on.
Rating:
Summary: Refreshing, Nice to know you aren't alone in your feelings
Review: First of all, I have no children, but it is refreshing to hear from women who have gone before me having the misgivings of giving up freedom and independence for marriage and children. This book is above all about how life isn't perfect, but I think that it still did a good job of showing the trials as well as the the joys of life from the perspective of women who have gone down different paths. This book is filled with essays, many written by some of my favorite authors. I recommend it highly. One word of advice is that you need to be able to put this book down. Read an essay or two and then wait a bit and read a few more. I can understand that it might get emotionally exhausting if read cover to cover.
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