Just Jennifer

What You Wish For by Kerry Reichs (William Morrow, July 2012)

For some women, having a baby is the next step after being married for a while.   For some, the choice is to wait until their career is established; some choose not to become mothers while still others must seek nontraditional ways to start a family.  Men have similar choices, though often not the final say and what about single men who wish to start a family but don’t foresee themselves marrying soon?  Kerry Reichs explores these different types of families and what women, and men, give up in order to start a family or to not start a family.  Dimple is a successful actress who is turning forty and hears the tick of her biological clock; she has also just gotten the role of a lifetime.  Eva, a Hollywood agent, can’t imagine ever wanting children, though she is supportive of her cousin Wyatt’s decision to pursue adoption as a single dad.  Wyatt has lost his first chance to become a father in an adoption scam; when his second chance threatens his job as a school principal he feels he may never have the joys of fatherhood.  When Maryn underwent treatment for her breast cancer, she and her husband Andy agreed to freeze some embryos.  Now the two are divorced and Maryn wants to implant some of the embryos, but Andy, who is running for city council, isn’t sure what to do, though his headstrong wife Summer is vocally against Maryn’s request.  These lives intertwine and collide, sometimes in surprising ways, as each person pursues his or her individual dream.  Maryn and Wyatt’s stories are a little more compelling than Dimple’s, and would have stood well in their own.  Other characters in the stories react in surprising ways to decisions made by those seeking a baby, making this a truly character driven story.