After the Race

"Readers will fall in love with Alexandra Alt, an Indiana University senior whose mother has instilled in her the values of what she calls First Lady First: Jane Ann Alt, in her bid to make her daughter the next Jacqueline Kennedy, exhorts her to learn how to ride horses, write thank you notes, win votes, and otherwise be the perfect political wife. Against the early eighties backdrop of Ronald Reagan, the AIDS crisis, and a bygone innocence, Alexandra is faced, during an internship in Washington, D.C., with choosing between Jake Banwell, who comes from a troubled, impoverished family in rural Indiana, and Bill Beck, who comes from the perfect political family and aspires to be president. Women of all ages will relate to Alexandra's struggle to choose between these men, as well as the struggle to rid herself of the inner voice of Jane Ann, who "thinks women's lib, the Equal Rights Amendment, and equal pay for equal work are ridiculous." After the Race is, then, a not just a love story but a chronicling of the pressures young women faced even after the feminist movement had supposedly liberated them. Moreoever, as Alexandra asks herself What do I really want? Or is the question what does Jane Ann want?, readers of all genders and backgrounds will relate to this age-old struggle of fulfilling one's own legacy rather than a parent's. After the Race is a delicious read that will have you on the edge of your seat until the very last page." Jacinda Townsend, author of Saint Monkey, Broadcast Journalist, Professor, University of California, Davis