Loose Ends

By: Barbara Raskin

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Synopsis: A witty, warm-hearted novel about a woman navigating the 1970s sexual revolution in Washington, DC, by the New York Times–bestselling author of Hot Flashes. For nine hours a day, Coco Burman secludes herself on a six-by-ten-foot porch with a gallon of gin, five six-packs of tonic water, half a carton of Marlboros, and a portable typewriter. This self-exile was prompted by her husband&’s confession of adultery. Though Coco herself has had seven extramarital affairs throughout their twelve-year marriage without getting caught, it&’s her husband&’s infidelity that really counts. She uses it as the perfect excuse to completely reorganize her life and determines to write the Great American Woman&’s Novel. But as the summer of 1972 drags on, Coco becomes increasingly caught between her post–women&’s lib ideals, her domestic obligations, and her prefeminist insecurities. Her novel is a means of showing the world how the inverted values of the 1950s have wreaked havoc on sensitive American women—and if she&’s lucky, it just might catapult her to fame. A funny and caustic look at the emotional and psychological battles of a 1970s unfulfilled wife and mother, Loose Ends is a powerful precursor to author Barbara Raskin&’s bestselling feminist novel, Hot Flashes.