The Next Best Thing

The irresistible new novel from the author of And What Do You Do?

A grass-is-greener comedy about the quagmire of female choices

One to get your teeth -- or claws -- into

Sarah Long worked in publishing before giving it all up to move to Paris with her husband and three children. She is the author of And What Do You Do? and, following several years of the Parisian experience, she now lives in London.

At thirty-five, Jane realises something rather disturbing. She thought she had her life perfectly balanced: working from home as a a freelance translator allows her to keep her financial independence, spend time with her daughter and escape office politics. But somehow, instead of combining a rewarding career with a satisfying mother-daughter relationship, she's become an all-purpose dogsbody, rushing from crisis to crisis and combining missing deadlines with repairing the dishwasher. 
 
Rupert is also leading the life he planned: a job in the city, glamorous girlfriend, plenty of money. But he's beginning to have doubts about the dull-but-sensible route he's chosen - and to realise it's just possible he wants more out of life. So when he and Jane meet, each escaping their day-to-day life with a stolen afternoon in the peace of the cinema, they both start to wonder whether it's really enough to settle for the next best thing ...

Sarah Long

Shopping, Shoes and Champagne. It's all work, work, work -Laura has it all.  A gorgeous husband, two beautiful children and an idyllic lady-of-leisure Parisian lifestyle.  She spends her mornings sharing croissants and a grand cr-me with her friends, her afternoons in the Louvre and her evenings attending sophisticated soirees.  It's the perfect life, isn't it? But hard as Laura's trying to enjoy her perfect life, it just doesn't seem to feel as perfect as it should.   It's hard to stretch 'meeting for coffee' to last the entire morning, the Scandinavian au pair is driving her to distraction, her husband's hardly ever in their beautiful home, and Parisian society doesn't exactly embrace the femme inactive. So when her husband embarks on an affair with the irritatingly petite Flavia, Laura decides it's time to review her life -

Sarah Long

Books by Sarah Long

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