The Love Children

Marilyn French's 1977 novel "The Women's Room" epitomised the feminist movement and became one of the most influential books of our time. Now she has captured the complexities of life for the generation that came of age with "The Women's Room" in her highly anticipated new novel "The Love Children". It is the late 1960s in Cambridge, Massachusetts. "The Grateful Dead" is playing on the radio and teenagers are wearing long hair and blue jeans. Jess Leighton, the daughter of a temperamental painter and a proto-feminist Harvard professor, is struggling to make sense of her world amid racial tensions, Vietnam War protests, and anti-government rage. With more options than her mother's generation, but no role model for creating the life she desires, Jess experiments with sex and psychedelic drugs as she searches for happiness on her own terms. In the midst of joining and fleeing a commune, growing organic vegetables, and operating a sustainable restaurant, Jess grapples with the legacy of her mother's generation.