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In REVENGE OF THE MIDDLE-AGED WOMAN, Elizabeth Buchan gave us a believable, touching woman facing the unthinkable, unpredictable end of her long-term loving marriage and then her triumphant rebound that had audiences everywhere applauding her survival. She was relatable, likable and convincing in her struggle and rebirth. And now Buchan's newest offering --- EVERYTHING SHE THOUGHT SHE WANTED --- finds two new women facing their own recognizable issues during two very different time periods.
The first, Barbara Beeching, is a forty-two-year-old mother of two grown-up children in the 1950s. Her husband, Ryder, is a loving mate and father on the verge of retiring from a long career as a pilot. Onlookers think they have the ideal life --- a beautiful home, a devout marriage, good friends. Until Alexander Liberty, a young, seductively attractive student, takes a surprising interest in the older Barbara. She can't believe her own passion for the new man in her life as she almost forgets what she would be sacrificing if she pursues her desires: "Suddenly I was filled with an incredible sense of freedom, almost unbearably so. I was here, in the sunshine and breeze, smelling Spring, and so was Alexander, and I could think of, consider, nothing else." Her ideal life, the life dictated by the era, was in jeopardy, but her spirit and heart were grappling with an internal want reawakened by this surprising attraction.
Fast forward to the 1990s and meet Siena Grant, whose own life is the envy of many women of her era. She enjoys a growing career and celebrity as a fashion journalist in Britain, has signed a lucrative book deal, and has the promise of a tempting job in America, if she wants it. And she has Charlie. Charlie is a sensitive and loyal attorney who married Siena with the hopes of a family and a country home. Can Siena give up everything she has worked for to "settle down" in a country home to raise children? "I was engaged in a battle," she thinks, "between my doubts and fears and what Charlie wanted, between my desire to escape my biology and my desire to kneel at his feet... "
The title phrase --- "everything she thought she wanted" --- refers to the desires of both Barbara and Siena, and the looming questions about what defines "everything." Excitement? Security? Love? Passion? Family? Career? Home? Does she (Barbara or Siena, or both) already have everything she thought she wanted? Or is she being tempted by it? The juxtaposition of the two ladies --- each emblematic of the values of their time --- is clever in its chapter by chapter reminder that the grass isn't always greener on the other side. Or is it? The two intersect only briefly, and perhaps unnecessarily, at the end of the book, but what they share in common is universal.
--- Reviewed by Roberta O'Hara
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