The Wednesday Sisters: A Novel, By Meg Waite Clayton
(Reviewed by Jane)

Clayton follows a group of mothers who meet in a Palo Alto park and share their changing lives as the late 1960s counterculture blossoms around them. Linda is a runner who is watching women’s progress at the Olympics. Brett is fascinated by the moon landing, where men are living out her astronaut dreams. Southern belle Kath isn’t convinced she has dreams outside of her marriage (but she’s open to persuasion), while quiet Ally only hopes for what the other women already have: a child.

Frankie, a Chicago transplant who has followed her computer genius husband to Silicon Valley, is the story’s narrator and the ladies’ ringleader, inspiring them all to follow her dream of becoming a writer. They write in moments snatched from their household chores and share their stories in the park. Though the narration and story lines are sometimes a bit syrupy, Clayton ably conjures the era’s details and captures the women’s changing roles in a world that expects little of them. … (more…)