Book Club Recap: A Window Opens by Elisabeth Egan

We had a good showing the other night–all but one member was in attendance.

A Window Opens was a disappointing read for most of the group. After deciding that the discussion questions were not worth addressing (too academic), we had free discussion. Some of the opinions shared by members were, “I identified with and enjoyed this book, but it was not book club material” and “I found it superficial–it did not elicit any emotion from the reader.” The general consensus was that A Window Opens reads more like a memoir than a work of fiction.

Next month’s book is We Are Not Ourselves by Matthew Thomas. This debut novel promises compelling characters and a story rife for discussion.

Stay tuned.

~ Julie ~

 

A Window Opens
written by Elisabeth Egan
published by Simon & Schuster, 2015

find it here: (affiliate links) Barnes & Noble (Nook) (print), Amazon, iBooks, Book Depository, Goodreads

See Julie’s 2.5-star review here.

About the book – from Goodreads: For fans of I Don’t Know How She Does It and Where’d You Go, Bernadette?.

In A Window Opens, beloved books editor at Glamour magazine, Elisabeth Egan, brings us Alice Pearse, a compulsively honest, longing-to-have-it-all, sandwich generation heroine for our social-media-obsessed, lean in (or opt out) age.

Like her fictional forebears Kate Reddy and Bridget Jones, Alice plays many roles (which she never refers to as “wearing many hats” and wishes you wouldn’t, either). She is a mostly-happily married mother of three, an attentive daughter, an ambivalent dog-owner, a part-time editor, a loyal neighbor and a Zen commuter. She is not: a cook, a craftswoman, a decorator, an active PTA member, a natural caretaker or the breadwinner. But when her husband makes a radical career change, Alice is ready to lean in—and she knows exactly how lucky she is to land a job at Scroll, a hip young start-up which promises to be the future of reading, with its chain of chic literary lounges and dedication to beloved classics. The Holy Grail of working mothers―an intellectually satisfying job and a happy personal life―seems suddenly within reach.

Despite the disapproval of her best friend, who owns the local bookstore, Alice is proud of her new “balancing act” (which is more like a three-ring circus) until her dad gets sick, her marriage flounders, her babysitter gets fed up, her kids start to grow up and her work takes an unexpected turn. Readers will cheer as Alice realizes the question is not whether it’s possible to have it all, but what does she―Alice Pearse―really want?

 

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