A story about social prejudice to a woman’s role in the home and the choices/or not that were available to them in the 1960’s.
It’s hard to believe how much has changed overtime, it makes you really appreciate just how much choice we do have now.
The main characters are a neighbourly group of canasta playing housewives who sometimes share their secrets, which can be a revelation at times! There is also Betsy who has come to work for the Bergs from a home for unwed mothers (you wonder how she got herself into that situation given that her education in this field seems to be rather limited).
My favourite character was Rose who pressed on regardless, least favourite was Marty.

Thank you to NetGalley for my copy of this book.
I normally read crime fiction so this was a big change for me, but I loved it.
Set in the suburbs of 1960’s USA it charts the lives of 6 women. Lily, Betsy, Rose, Sarah, Becca and Robin.
It’s amazing how women’s lives have changed since those days. It must have been so lonely

This was an enlightening and informative book. It certainly made me think of how the world has changed. All the characters are likeable and develop throughout the story.
I cannot stress enough that I would recommend this book to teenage females so they can understand and appreciate the way things are today. It's not at all peachy but covers so many social norms and how it affected females at the time.

A fantastic story set in 1960s USA about a group of female friends experiencing marriage and motherhood. Impeccably researched, intensely emotional it is a novel everyone should read and strive to prevent backward changes. I loved the characters and the period detail.

A 5 star read. A group of American women in 1965 come to be friends over weekly games of canasta.. They cannot have their own bank accounts, take out mortgages or work once they have a child. Divorce is frowned upon and abortion illegal.

Lily Berg, a doctor’s wife, takes in Betsy, a pregnant teenager from the local unwed mothers’ home, to help around the house as she prepares for the birth of her second child. Betsy has never met a Jewish family before and has never cared for a child. She is ignorant about how her body works and relies on prim and proper Lily to guide her. She has been sent away to avoid a scandal - the baby will be adopted and she can then rejoin her family.

Both Becky, her friend, and Rose, her sister, face the dilemma of being pregnant but not wanting the baby - both have to undertake huge risks to be able to make the best decisions for themselves. Rose is the victim of an abusive relationship and finds herself pregnant - to gain her divorce she has to manipulate her husband and then relies on her father to be able to enter a rental agreement. Becky has three boys and finds herself pregnant while her husband’s business is failing - they cannot afford another child.

Sarah has suffered five miscarriages and is unable to talk about this trauma.

Lily while supporting her friends wonders if this is all there is - she questions her role and finds herself a new purpose.

The story finishes in the mid 1980s with JoJo - Lily’s first child - meeting Betsy - now a doctor. We learn of the fortunes of the women in the intervening years.

A heartbreaking story - so relevant currently when a women’s right to choose is again being compromised.

This book was nothing like I was expecting, it was excellent!
Very well written and an extensive amount of research has been done.
Set in 1965 in America, Lily is a young mother who kindly takes in an unmarried 15 year old pregnant girl. Lily has a heart of gold, however she’s extremely prim and proper, so when her best friend makes an illegal decision it makes Lily question her thoughts and beliefs.
There’s Rose whose husband isn’t the man she thought he was.
Betsy who doesn’t know the facts of life and doesn’t know how she got pregnant.
Plus several other characters who help to make this book fascinating and very readable

This is a powerful novel dealing with significant societal issues, attitudes and practices that we might struggle to understand nowadays. Despite this, Becker manages to pull us into a great storyline filled with interesting characters, giving insight into their lives, privileges and traumas. The book deals with ethical and moral issues alongside instances of domestic violence, rape, discrimination and misogyny. Brilliantly done and a four and a half star read

Set in the mid-sixties this novel explores the lives of 4 women quite unlike each other. Although Lily, Becca and Rose are part of a group of housewife, their personalities and approaches to life are very distinct.

When Betsy, a pregnant teenager, comes into their lives, it changes everything - making each woman question her decisions and beliefs.

This is a good read, featuring believable characters facing the kind of real life questions that many readers will relate to. Worth checking out,

The book was set in the mid 1960s in the USA. It was about a group of women living in a small town. Every Tuesday they meet in each other’s houses to play canasta and discuss their lives. This is the America where woman couldn’t get bank accounts or rent a home without a man. Abortion was illegal.
A young obstetricians wife, Lily Berg, was pregnant with her second child and decided to take on an unwed teenage pregnant girl who was living at a local home for unwed mothers, as an au pair. Betsy had never met a Jewish family before and was sent to live with them until a few weeks before her own baby was due. She would help with housework and looking after Lily’s daughter. Once Betsy was back to the home they were to have no contact ever again and the baby would be adopted.
It was a sobering read, especially with the modern USA where abortion is again illegal in some states. The book finished up with us meeting Betsy several years later and finding out what had happened to her baby and Lily and her friends and family. A very good read.

Set in 1960's middle America and around a group of housewives, In the Family Way takes us back to the way life was for women 60 years ago. Very few rights of their own. Passed from the ownership of their father to their husband on marriage. Desiring something more but unsure what. A time of great change in the air. Into this group comes Betsy. An unmarried mother to be. The epitome of shame to her family who has been sent away to a mother and baby home by her family but loaned out as a mothers help for several months during her pregnancy. Poor Betsy has no idea how she got pregnant, how to look after a baby or what will happen at the birth. I was a teenager in the 60s albeit in the UK and remember all this very well. I thoroughly enjoyed In the Family Way and despair that the US is returning to pre Roe and Wade times. A brilliant book that had me close to tears at the innocence and frustrations of the women of those times. Recommended wholeheartedly.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the opportunity to read an advance copy. All opinions are my own.

A gentle introduction onto women’s mentality and place in the 1950s through the eyes of four friends and a sister all struggling in different ways to the norms and mores of a very different era. Shocking by today’s accepted rules and regulations, birth control only given to married women., pregnancy without marriage meant damaged goods and something to be hidden away until no option other than adoption. A man could not be guilty to rape of his wife as she was perceived in law as his property and god forbid giving the correct term for female anatomy but rather disguised by speaking in innuendos. Five women all struggling for various reasons and at the heart of this complex mix, a fifteen year old innocent, and pregnant child ignorant of the facts of life, with little idea of how it happened and the consequences. One of the more harrowing of Betsy’s questions to her older married mentor and friend was the question ‘but how does it get out’ . Abortion illegal and decisions regarding termination so stringent that back street abortions and subsequent morbidity thriving as the norm. The reader experiences each woman's hidden traumas in explicit and often heartbreaking and harrowing detail until an unexpected tying up of numerous ends leaves a heartwarming conclusion of friendship, support and necessary changes in their attitudes and perspectives once reality strikes closer to home. Many thanks to Author Publisher and Netgalley for this ARC.

This isn't the typical type of novel that I would read but was drawn in by the premise and I am glad I chose to read it.

Beautiful story, beautifully written

Thank you to the publisher for inviting me to a review a preview ARC. As I believe its such a privilege to be invited to review I almost always read and download straight away.
I am so glad that I didn’t delay reviewing In the e Family Way as it blew me away. The theme, the characters and the glimpse gives into the women’s lives for someone born not even 10 years after is eye opening. And I have spent a long time after the final paragraph thinking about these strong, courageous women long who pushed for change.

This is a glimpse into the lives of five woman and their access to their reproductive choices. With different sides of the right to choose told through five different women and the options open to them and I was just sorry that the novel came to a finish and the glimpse into the friend’s lives came to an end.

As a narrative this is an important one and I would recommend any woman to read the choices of a 1960s woman and think about the choices we have because of the battles they fought for us.

This book is outside my usual genre, and it’s not one I would usually pick up based on the blurb, but I have to say that I absolutely loved it. I read it easily in a single day, it’s so well written.

The story is set in the time when women were the property of men, no abortions, being sacked for becoming pregnant, before any woman’s rights, and becoming pregnant outside of marriage was shameful, and girls were sent off to homes until they gave birth and the babies were given away.

The plot is basically around this, and a group of ladies not really minding this, but then a teenager comes amongst them and they start actually thinking - helped along by one of the ladies who attends protests, and minds start to change?

Really enjoyable!


My thanks to Netgalley and Rachel Quinn Marketing for the advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

I absolutely loved this slice of 1960s America. Nostalgic, yes, but it also peeled back the veneer of the archetypal American Dream scenario to reveal what life was really like for women and housewives in the days when their options were limited in so many ways.

Absolutely brilliant book! Set in the 60s the book examines the life of a group of friends trying to navigate through times that we've long since consigned to the past .....or have we!

The times they were achangin' - and for the better.
This book is a time capsule showing the situation that existed in the mid-1960s USA and indeed in much of the world. It is even still the same in some parts of the planet.
It centres around the wives in a closed knit group in a middle class community, middle class community, who appear to be living the dream,with their own cars, the latest household appliances, weekly canasta sessions and many other things. However they are very restricted in what they can do, not in the sense of "The Stepford Wives," but they can't vote, can't sit on a jury, and not have a bank account without their husbands' permission, and many other things that are now taken for granted. They were effectively chattles under the rigorous control of their husbands.
Lanzy Katz Becker has crafted a book that takes that situation and has shown how it has changed at a very personal level for the players.
I am old enough to have lived through the times described as a teenager, though in the UK rather than the USA. Here we were a couple of years ahead due to our "invention of The Swinging Sixties" and all that it led to.
This is a thought-provoking book that deserves a very wide audience.

What a timely reminder of what women had to fight against to get the rights that we have now but for some are being retracted. It was an interesting read and I really liked the ending which tied everything together.

I wasn’t sure if this was going to be my type of book, but I was so wrong. I really enjoyed it. It is set in the mid sixties when women didn’t have independence to live their own lives. Sisters Lily and Rose, along with Lily’s friends have to face up to many challenges, which today would not have the same impact. The story tells how each of them dealt with their own problems and how they supported each other. How would we have reacted to these issues? I liked the way Laney tied up the ending. I found it an interesting, informative and enjoyable read. My thanks go to NetGalley, Laney Katz Becker and the publishers Harper Collins for an arc of this super book.

I really liked this story. I got so hooked I finished it at 02:00! Set in 1965 it concerns the lives of some middle America housewives. Brought up to expect nothing more than being a wife and mother at the beck and call of their husbands. But…” the times they are a-changing”. They begin to question the patriarchal society norms especially when it involves pregnancy, domestic violence and aspirations. The main character is a fifteen year old who is pregnant ( and doesn’t know how that happened cos no one told her the ‘facts of life’). She is sent to live with a married couple as a ‘help’ until her baby arrives. She matures under the guidance of Lily, Rose, Becca and Sarah - and so do they! The women chat about all things babies, one wants them but can’t have them, one has them but don’t want more and one becomes pregnant in dire circumstances and faces a huge decision which will affect them all. The book is a reminder of how far women have come. When I was married in 1975, many of the same themes were still prevalent in the UK. Women’s Lib was gaining pace but it started with women like those in the book! Great book for a book club or a modern history syllabus in school.This one will stay with me for a long time.