Cirrus@Austlit

'It's been ages since Jo, Helen, Ereka and CJ first became friends through their mothers' group-back then, life revolved around their small children. Now their kids are pre-teens and teenagers with attitudes, iPods and raging hormones, and life is feeling emptier for some mothers, more liberating for others.

'While away together in an old country house with a couple of new friends and plenty of wine and food, it's not long before the women are discussing men, marriage and parenting, sharing intimacies and confiding vulnerabilities. Friendships are put on the line as the bonds between them are tested and the weekend takes some unexpected turns.

'Picking up where the international bestseller Secret Mothers' Business left off, The Reunion is an insightful, funny and often biting novel about the challenges women face as their bodies change, dreams fade and kids grow up. Ultimately it explores what it means to be a good friend, a good person and a good mother-and suggests that all love is about learning to let go.' (Publisher's blurb)

'They have been close friends for almost two decades, supporting each other through personal and professional crises parents dying, children leaving home, house moves, job changes, political activism, diets and really bad haircuts. Now the 'gang of four', Isabel, Sally, Robin and Grace, are all fifty-something, successful and restless. It is Isabel who makes the first move, taking a year away from her family to follow in her mother's footsteps across Europe. Soon Sally is on her way to San Francisco, to come face to face with a guilty secret. Robin, in the wake of a clandestine relationship, heads for isolation in the country. And Grace? Well, Grace would never go away for an entire year, but, lonely in the others' absence, she thinks she might take a short holiday in England. Once there, she bumps into someone she hardly knows herself.'

Source: Publisher's blurb.