Big Girls Don't Cry

A New York Times Notable Book of the Year. “[A] wry and witty examination of where feminism went wrong and, occasionally, right . . . sharp, funny.” —Kirkus Reviews

This latest offering from critically acclaimed author Fay Weldon is a darkly comic romp through the minefields of friendship and feminism. On a balmy evening in 1971, five women meet in a cramped living room in the suburbs of London. Tired of their husbands and their own unsatisfying lives, they form the aptly named Medusa, a book publishing house founded on the principle of “getting even.” With wry and savvy humor, Weldon weaves us through twenty years of these women’s lives, as good intentions fall by the wayside and the hazards of their new politics, sex, and infidelity take their toll.

“Weldon at her feisty best. Always the mistress of the ironic understatement . . . she has built here a dramatic Technicolor landscape . . . Sly, arch, poised, and funny . . . Big Girls Don’t Cry stands absolutely in its own right.” —Mail on Sunday (London)

“A postmodern comedy of manners that owes more to Jane Austen than Germaine Greer . . . She here reaches beyond the stereotypes of the good woman and bad man to create a novelistic family that is genuinely down and dirty, real and gritty.” —The Washington Times

“Supremely satisfying and very funny.” —Cleveland Plain Dealer

“A characteristically tart look back at the early days of feminism as experienced by four Londoners . . . Weldon wryly applauds the effort it takes to remain faithful to the cause.” —Publishers Weekly