In my last blog, I wrote about the “recession lit” angle of my new novel, Social Lives, which is coming out Tuesday. The issue of what a woman does when she has spent her prime years working for her family, only to have her husband leave them in ruin, is fascinating and drives the suspense of the book. But a second issue underpinning the story involves 14 year-old Caitlin Barlow and her new friends, who engage is the epidemic of their generation – the “Friends with Benefits” or “Hooking Up” phenomenon.

Here is how that works. A group of friends hang out – at school, after school, at parties. Boys and girls all within a circle of friends. Randomly and without any intention or promise of emotional intimacy, they hook up, which mostly involves the girls performing sexual favors for the boys. I have heard professionals discuss this issue with great concern, as it appears this generation is losing the ability to form meaningful emotional relationships that become the foundation for physical intimacy. Instead, the physical intimacy is completely detached and given no greater significance than, say, having a conversation or going to a movie. 

For those of you as ancient as I, remember those teen years? Remember being at a party and secretly liking a guy who was there? If he talked to you, or kissed you, there was an expectation of dating and a hope of a relationship. If he went in a corner and made out with your best friend, you went home with a bruised or broken heart, regrouped and started over. And if things got far enough for clothes to start hitting the floor, there was always the possibility of a one-night stand, but also the hope of something more.

None of that seems to exist anymore. From teen years into early twenties, men and women hook up without expectation, but with an on-going, caring friendship. If they are in need of some physical attention, they start texting around to see who’s free. The “friends with benefits” of the teen years become the “fuck buddies” of the twenties. And no one seems to know how to navigate away from this when feelings develop beyond casual sexual desire.

So what’s wrong with this? Is this just a natural progression of the social networking that younger generations have grown up with? Is Twittering and Facebooking creating a different social culture in which hooking up is the natural extension? And is this all healthy, in spite of how foreign it may seem to me and my generation? I actually have a strong opinion about this. NO!

First and foremost, let’s go back to the fact that most of the teenage hooking up is girls performing sex acts on boys. The unreciprocated blow job. It shocked me to learn that one of the most prevalent STD’s among teenage girls is now gonorrhea of the throat. Yes, that’s right. Of the throat. From a feminist perspective, and as the mother of three boys, I find this to be a glaring hole in any argument made which suggests this is healthy. Moral issues aside, boys are getting sex and girls are giving sex. That inequity alone is enough of a red flag that something is not right here.

But now let’s talk about morality, and the social consequences of this behavior. To assume that sex and emotional intimacy can be so completely extricated is absurd. Yes, there is sex for sex. And yes, there are happy one-night stands and prostitution and on and on. But we are not talking about that. We are talking about friends who know each other, see each other, respect each other. To pretend that a young girl walks away from a hallway blow job feeling nothing for the boy, either disgust or longing, is to belie the very existence of our humanity. I don’t care what anyone says or writes. In that room of teenagers, every boy secretly wants the attention of one girl more than the others, and every girl secretly wants to catch the eye of one boy over the others. Whether they admit it or not, act on it or not, this is the reality of attraction. So when that girl goes into a bedroom with a different guy, or vice versa, there are feelings of disappointment and jealousy and hurt. And, OMG – there they are! Real emotions. So why is such effort being made to deny them?

Caitlin Barlow is wealthy and privileged and beautiful. Yet, until now, she has not been popular. Suddenly, she is offered a place among the elite at her school and she takes it, even though it means participating in activities that make her profoundly uncomfortable. She does a sexual favor for one of the boys in their circle, and she finds herself obsessed with him. His hands on her body, his mouth on her mouth – all of these feelings are woven into what she believes to be love. And yet, at every turn, she must endure his casual indifference to her and his availability to receive favors from other girls. It tortures her, and making him see her, and feel for her what she feels for him, becomes her life’s only purpose. And drives her to the brink of disaster.

For Caitlin, and indeed for all of us, to feel the heat of passion and see the longing in the eyes of a lover – and then to have it disappear within seconds – is dehumanizing. If that kind of intensity isn’t real, then nothing can be. And without a sense of reality in the world, we are left with a sense of chaos.

Cailtin’s journey through this experience is disturbing and moving, and at its core, deeply human. I hope readers will relate to her and find her story compelling and thought provoking.

The New York Times just published an article on the trend of women writers to integrate the recent economic downturn into their plots. I was thrilled to be one of the writers discussed in that article NYT/Social Lives, and it occurred to me that my readers might enjoy some thoughts on this and the other social issues that are shaking up my characters’ lives in my new novel, Social Lives.

So here we go. First, check out my new video trailer for the book. It says a lot about the topic.

I started writing Social Lives almost two years ago, well before anyone could even foresee what might transpire from the multi-layered mortgage derivatives that had proliferated within Wall Street hedge funds. Having just covered the issue of women “opting out” of paying careers in my first book, Four Wives, I wanted to find a new angle to explore. The characters in Four Wives are each facing a personal, internal crisis resulting from the choice they have made to be suburban housewives. It seemed appropriate to see what might happen when the consequences of that choice became more tangible and urgent.

I have written on numerous occasions about the bizarre social structure that I am a product of and that still surrounds me out here in the wealthy burbs. (See my article Opt Out Universe). It may seem controversial to say this, but as long as there is a free market economy and outrageously high paying jobs a mere train ride away, nothing is going to change. Those jobs are 24/7 and anyone who thinks they can be wrestled into becoming “family friendly” needs to take a basic economics class. There will always be someone willing to work longer and harder. Smart only gets you so far. What that leaves is a complete void on the home front, which is filled by wives who care for children, husbands and houses. There are some exceptions of course – the two income households, the Wall Street woman and Mr. Mom – but they are rare.

So what becomes of a woman who has spent seventeen years as the wife of a Wall Street banker who is about to lose everything? This is a woman who is highly skilled. She can manage a staff. She can decorate with impeccable taste. She can host a party like a professional. And she is mother, doctor, shrink and social worker to her numerous children – the next elite generation. She has worked hard, studied her surroundings and was and is invaluable to the success of her husband. And yet, after all those years, she has no marketable skills – no value in the world unless she is attached to a man as his wife.

Enter Jacqueline Halstead. After discovering that her husband is being investigated for a Bernie Madoff type scheme in his hedge fund, she begins to realize the extent of ruin her life, and the lives of her children, sister, and sister’s children, will be in if her suspicions are right. Lacking any formal education or career experience, Jacks has nothing to fall back on except the thing she knows best. Being someone’s wife.

What happens to Jacks in Social Lives, and how she comes to see the life she’s created, are fiction. But a quick perusal of today’s headlines underscores the very real consequences for women whose husbands fail to live up to their end of the implicit bargain. Without any legal recourse, these women, and their children, are not only left with little money, they are left without the resources that working women acquire throughout these vital years.

What is strange for me is that I am not a diehard advocate of women choosing work over raising children. Being a stay home mom was my life for over a decade, and even though I have a law degree to fall back on, the salary I could earn in this economy and after not practicing for so many years would hardly pay for the childcare I would need to cover my absence from the home.

So where does this leave us? What do all of these books, including Social Lives, say about our culture? Are they advocates for change? Condemnations of how we value the work women do in the home? Or simply entertaining exposes on the plight of the wealthy, who – by many accounts – created this situation to begin with? Hmmm.

For me, it’s really none of the above. I don’t believe we can truly alter the division of labor in the wealthy suburbs. Nor do I see gender roles changing that much either. Instead, I wrote Jacks’ story in Social Lives because it posed a fascinating dilemma for a compelling character, and by following Jacks through her journey, maybe we can all learn more about ourselves – and the people we find ourselves wondering about in the world.

RAnn writes a book blog for This That and the Other Thing at http://rannthisthat.blogspot.com/

Here is my interview with RAnn!

Q: How did you become a book review blogger?

A:  I’ve been blogging since 2005, but always had trouble thinking of topics about which to write.  I started discovering book blogs and eventually I decided I could do that too.  I started just reviewing library books or books I acquired through Bookmooch.  Then, in 2008 I surfed onto a blog that was part of the FIRST alliance, a group of bloggers who review Christian literature.  That was my introduction to the concept of books in return for blog posts.  As a part of that group, I started reading book blogs more regularly and discovering more sources for review books.

Q: How do you decide what books to review?

A:  Basically, I review everything I read.  I’ve joined several blog tour groups, several publicists have me on their mailing lists, and I even go to the bookstore periodically.  I  keep my Bookmooch account active.  I also review for Thomas Nelson, The Catholic Company and Tiber River.  As books are offered for review, if the summary or teaser sent out appeals to me, I order the book.  Once I establish a relationship with a publicist, I keep an eye on his/her website to see if there is anything there I’d like to read, and if so, I volunteer my services.   That’s how I discovered your books, Four Wives and Power Moms. 

Q: What is the demographic of your readership, and do you choose books that are marketed towards them?

A:  Judging by my followers, I’d say mostly  women.  Quite a few are Catholic; others tend to be Christian of one sort or another.  I don’t really choose books marketed toward my audience; rather, I think I attract a certain audience because of the books I choose. 

Q: Do you ever do reviews to intentionally expose your readers to books they might not otherwise pick up on their own?

A:  No.

Q: How much does cover design and title influence your decision about doing a review?

A:  An interesting cover design or title may influence me to pick up a book at the bookstore or library.  However, at this time, much of my reading material comes from publicists or blog tour groups, and the cover is not part of the message sent to me asking if I want to review the book.  The title may pique my interest, but mainly what I read is the blurb from the publicist asking if I want to review a book. 

Q: When reading a book for a review, do you read as you would strictly for your own pleasure or are you keeping an eye out for certain components?

A:  My goal in writing a review is to give my readers a summary of the book and to let them know if they are likely to like it.  Given that goal, I’d say that I read review books as I do any other pleasure reading (because book blogging is a hobby, not a job). 

Q: What is more important to you, quality of writing or the actual story?

A:  In general, as far as quality of writing, I put books in three categories:  awful, average and extraordinary.  The overwhelming majority of books put out by traditional publishing houses are in the “average” category; which to me means I don’t notice the writing quality.  I base my opinion about whether I like the book on the actual story.  The writing in a very small number of books is extraordinary.  There is something about the way the author uses words that just hits me somehow.  When that happens, you can be sure it will be mentioned in my review.  So far, when the writing has appealed to me, the book has; though in one case, because of the way the story ended, I moved a book from the five star category to three stars.  As far as awful writing, think self-published.  While I’ve read a few well-written self-published books, generally speaking, it doesn’t take long to figure out why mainstream publishers didn’t pick up these books. 

Q: Do you compare your reviews of a given book to those of your peers? If so, do you find your views are generally similar or dissimilar?

A:  When I participate in a blog tour, I generally try to read some of the postings about the book.  In general, I’d say book bloggers tend to be positive about books, probably because, as unpaid reviewers, we don’t HAVE to read anything; and if we really don’t like it, we just don’t finish the book or write about it.  That being said, there have been times where I wrote a less than stellar review of a book and found that other reviewers felt the same way. 

Q: Do you think the consolidation of the publishing industry has been positive or negative for the quality and diversity of books that make it to the market?

A:  I don’t know enough about this to intelligently answer the question. 

Q: Do you think e-books are going to make printed books obsolete like CD’s have become in the wake of the ipod revolution?

A:  Well, you never want to say “never”, but I think the Kindle and its ilk will have to become a lot cheaper before they give books a run for their money.  It is one thing to take a $10.00 book to the beach—if it gets sandy or wet or whatever, then I’m out $10.00.  If my Kindle gets wet or sandy, then I’m out a lot more.  It looks too big to tuck in my purse.  As far as the “books” themselves, I guess part of it is a price point thing.  Many readers buy relatively few books, especially new books.  We use the library, swap with friends or use book swapping services.  If there was some way the software could allow you to rent a book for a given length of time for a relatively small cost, that could be a win/win for authors/publishers and readers.  I’m sure that the sophisticated used book market that has developed in the internet has hurt you; yet as a reader I cannot spend the full price of the average book for the number of books I read.  If I could rent them for $2-3 each and the software involved insured that I didn’t share them with my friends and the production and distribution costs were low for you, then we’d both win.  So, to answer your question, yes, I guess I do think it is possible, but not with the current hardware and pricing scheme.

Q: What is the best reward for you from blogging about books?

A:  The books of course!  I’ll also admit to enjoying the idea of having an audience  read what I write. 

Q: What are your three favorite books?

A:  Honestly, I don’t have any.  I’ve always loved to read, and at times in my life have gone through what many people would consider a huge number of books.  I’m on a reading kick right now, and in the first six months of this year, I read and blogged about 125 books (though I think about ten of them were children’s books).  That being said, books are temporary visitors in my life.

Thanks RAnn!