The Good Daughters / Joyce Maynard / 278 pages

I think what attracted me to this book was the two girls born the same day in the same hospital in 1950....just like me and one of my cousins. Would it be funny like that movie Big Business with Lily Tomlin and Bette Midler? Nope. Maynard is a great storyteller who can keep you turning the pages. She offers lots of emotion, feelings about love and family, parental roles in our lives, what's important in life and trials of figuring out who we are. It is very apparent early in the book why the girls feel out of place in their families yet the story is mesmerizing and you want to keep reading to find out if in the end they are happy with themselves and what life brings them. It is hard to imagine what it would have been like to be either of the daughters or either of the mothers yet you feel like you've known people just like them. Details of changing life in the 50's, 60's and 70's make the book seem real to anyone who lived them! Go ahead and read it and let me know what you think!