Alice Pearse knows her place in this world and she loves it. Wife to Nicholas, mother to Margot, Oliver and Georgie, and working part-time at You Magazine, she juggles it all. Although this was not the dream job in publishing that she had always envisioned, it allows her to be there for her family and her parents, and still be involved with books, which are so important in her life. But when her husband drops the bombshell that he has quit his job at a successful law firm and wants to try working for himself, Alice's secure life seems to be slipping away. Forced to find full-time work, Alice is shocked when she manages to land her perfect job. Working for Scroll, an innovative, unique company revolutionizing the book-buying business, things are suddenly looking up. Maybe this is Alice's chance to have it all. But what happens when having it all isn't really what you want?
A WINDOW OPENS by Elisabeth Egan is a contemporary tale about balancing life, love, work and heartbreak. Alice finds herself thrust into a world she always wanted to be apart of, but as everyone around her suffers, she loses herself and her convictions in the hectic atmosphere surrounding her. Elisabeth Egan depicts the madness of family life and demanding careers effortlessly in this novel, and the characters are realistic and endearing. A WINDOW OPENS by Elisabeth Egan is an engaging, modern tale and deals with the burning question of whether the grass is always greener on the other side.
Fans of I Donβt Know How She Does It and Whereβd
You Go, Bernadette? will cheer at this βfresh, funny
take on the age-old struggle to have it allβ (People)
about what happens when a wife and mother of three leaps at
the chance to fulfill her professional destinyβonly to learn
every opportunity comes at a price.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
βwearing many hatsβ and wishes you wouldnβt, 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 inβand 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 βbalancing actβ (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 itβs possible to have it all, but what does
she―Alice Pearse―really want?
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