Adult Education

A rediscovered gem about women's friendship and the shared longings of young wives and mothers.Becca is a former dancer from Bennington, now an aspiring poet; a ditzy but brilliant young red head from Chicago who uses humor to fend off the world. Ulli is a calm, deeply optimistic, smoothly beautiful ex-fashion model from Sweden. Newly married-Ulli to a TV news anchor, Becca to a successful professor and expectant mothers living just off the campus of a major university, they meet in an adult ed class and begin a friendship that changes their lives. Raising their children together, telling the intimate secrets of the past, helping each other cope with their less than perfect marriages-to laugh at what is not perfect in life and appreciate what is-this is the story of the attraction of opposites, of the friendship we all once had and wish we had held onto. Originally published to stunning international acclaim, now back in print with an Afterword by the author, Adult Education is"An engaging, engrossing, sometimes wallopingly funny novel...The discovery of Jaffee is a delight."-The Los Angeles Times"A wonderful novel; funny and heartbreaking, cruelly satiric and tender."-Joyce Carol Oates"An exuberant chronicle of growing upa poignant and funny and wholly recognizable picture of our times."-Rosellen Brown"Fervent and funnyThere's no soft focus, no airbursh. She launches into details about which women are matter-of-fact and men are notoriously squeamish. Becca's water breaks, her breasts leak. Becca behaves, for the most part, the way women do when men aren't watching."-The Washington Post"A fine, strong work, one that frequently strikes to the heart of the fearful complexities inherent in human relationships."-The Dallas Morning NewsAnnette Williams Jaffee is the author of The Dangerous Age (Leapfrog) and Recent History (Putnam). She lives on the Delaware River in Bucks County, Pennsylvania and is at work on a new novel about writing women.