I really liked this book. It made me think of my best friends and the bond of friendship among women. Meg captures all of that beautifully. The other thing I really appreciated about this book is it wasn't a male bashing - woman's power sort of book. There are good men in it, great men and a crappy man. I am so sick of books that make women perfect and men the root of all evil. Loved that. ( )

A novel about a woman learning to write a novel – I love it! A story about getting by with a little help from your friends. Very enjoyable. ( )

This novel started out so promising but did not live up to it. None of the characters were very interesting or likeable. The developing friendship amidst the changing social backdrop of the sixties and seventies provided good context,. but surely we women weren't all that insecure and had just a bit more gumption? ( )

Where do I start with this review? I had high hopes for this book. I went into this book thinking that these women would be bright, funny, witty, interesting, other synonyms for awesome. I was very disappointed. The women in this book are boring. They are very dependent upon their husbands and have no real opinions of their own.

One woman, Frankie, spends half the book worrying about what will become of her if her husband loses his job, because she views herself as only as good as what her husband does for a living. Gross.

Another woman, Ally, believes she is not woman enough because she continues to miscarry and can't bring a pregnancy to term as if her entire life purpose is to be a wife and mother. Gross.

A third woman, Kath, refuses to divorce her husband when he has an affair with a woman who shares her name. She continues to stay with him even after he moves into an apartment with his mistress because she doesn't want her friends and family to know he's left her. God forbid society know that she's a working single mother. Gross.

After finding out that she has breast cancer, Linda struggles with the decision to have a mastectomy because she'd rather die than live with the idea that her husband may not want her because she no longer has breasts. Gross.

And finally Brett...graduated valedictorian of her class at Stanford and goes on to get a graduates degree. She dreams of becoming an astronaut but throws it all away to become a stay at home mom because she doesn't want society to know she is smarter than her husband. Very gross.

These things might be okay if the point of the story was that they overcame them, but they do not. The exception being perhaps Linda who does in fact get the mastectomy and Ally who finally has that baby. But Frankie never sees herself outside of her husband, Kath never leaves her cheating husband, and Brett never becomes an astronaut, or does anything substantial with her degree.

The plot of this book is all over the place. There are things mentioned briefly that are somewhat intriguing but never mentioned again. Things that are brought up that have no relevance whatsoever. To be completely honest, I'm not certain what the plot even is.

To sum up this review, I'll answer a couple simple questions.
What did I obtain from reading this book? A headache.
What feeling was a left with once finishing this book? Relief it was finally over. ( )

Loved it. It's inspiring and entertaining -- really speaks to the heart of those who love to read. I will be giving copies of this as gifts. ( )