Middle Women (ePub)

Three friends, three losses, three new lives.

At fifty-two Jo is homeless after her husband gambled it away along with her security. Her two friends: the irrepressible, irreverent Kat and sensible-shoes Marion have also lost partners: one to premature death and the other, adultery. Together, the three friends support each other to take their first hesitant steps towards a new life. A life that promises to be both terrifying and achingly exciting.

Faced with an uncertain future Jo discovers that women over fifty-five are the fastest growing homeless sector in Australia. In response the three friends set up an online business to help older homeless women, hiring Mac, an IT specialist, and widower burdened by guilt over his late wife's death.

As Mac and Jo are thrown together Jo tries to ignore a growing attraction, weighing it off against her newly discovered independence. She, like her two friends, must come to terms with the competing needs of an intimate relationship and self- determination. This leads Jo to explore whether both can co-exist inside a new relationship while Kat, always the rebel, resolves to find meaning beyond privilege by starting SHE, a political party dedicated to issues that women care about most. Marion, in turn, gradually slowly discovers loyalty need not extend beyond the grave.

But all three quickly learn that change, once started, can be slippery and its effects - irrevocable.