After my mom died in April, I started culling through random photos, grocery lists, checkbooks and other memorabilia she had tucked  in long forgotten boxes. It’s almost like a time capsule to show me how expectations, routines and roles have evolved since the mid-1960s.

I’m increasingly intrigued by this era of the 1960s. While I was alive at this point in history, I was a completely sheltered grammar school kid unaware of the political, social and moral tsunami that was giving my mother’s generation options, challenges and choices never before available to women.

Maybe that intrigue is what initially pulled me toward the description of “The Book Club for Troublesome Women” by Marie Bostwick.

“The Bettys”

The premise of the book centers around four suburban housewives of varying ages, wealth and social status in the early 1960s. They move with their families into a newfangled planned suburb of Washington DC called Concordia (anyone familiar with the ‘burbs of DC may recognize the early days of Reston in some of these descriptions).

The one thing they all share is the need for connection with other women. But it’s not the surface connection that arises from their weekly ladies’ “coffee klatch” in the neighborhood. At these gabfests, the conversation revolves around trading recipes or bitching about neighbors’ yards.

But Margaret, Viv, Bitsy and Charlotte are all craving something they don’t even know could be available to them – autonomy.

Through several convergences of circumstances, the women end up forming a book club where their first book is Betty Friedan’s controversial new book called “The Feminine Mystique.” They all read the book with varying levels of interest.

There’s enough foreshadowing in the plot for a reader to quickly establish each character’s desire to do more in life than what tradition and strict roles currently allow.

Margaret wants to write. Charlotte wants to be taken seriously as an artist. Viv wants to return to nursing. Bitsy wants the education and veterinary career that marriage interrupted.

None of these women have dreams that feel particularly lofty in today’s world. But in the 1960s, these dreams could only be shared in secret. “The Feminine Mystique” changed these characters’ vision of what they could accomplish.

Dubbing themselves ‘The Bettys’ after Friedan, the women begin to see “The Feminine Mystique” almost as another member of the group. This character quietly nibbles at each woman’s dreams pushing them to do more, be more, but without losing who they are. All this despite the fact they can’t get birth control pills or open a bank account without their husband’s permission.

What I Loved

The charm of this book hinged on several things for me.

First, there are enough accurate historical references to make the book feel real. I especially loved the references to groundbreaking women journalists who Margaret meets through Bitsy’s horseback riding buddy who happens to be the wife of the Washington Post’s publisher. UPI’s Helen Thomas, NPR’s Susan Stamberg and Mary McBride, a radio news trailblazer, all play inspirational roles in Margaret’s quest to write.

Second, books set in Washington DC always resonate after my years of living in and visiting the nation’s Capital. Even back in the 60s, traffic round-abouts were the inner circle of hell and Rock Creek Parkway traffic was a mess.

Finally, some of the 1960s references particularly made me smile.

• S&H Green Stamp books are called “the underground currency of housewives.”
• How many times have we heard the saying, “You can have it all. Just not all at once.” I didn’t know that originated in The Feminine Mystique.”
• Discussions among “The Bettys” about how comfortable panty hose can be when compared with girdles and stockings.

Maybe that’s ultimately why “The Book Club for Troublesome Women” stuck with me. As I sort through the memorabilia of my mother’s life as a young mother and housewife in the 1960s, I find myself wondering more about the world she was navigating and the choices women like her were only beginning to realize they could make.

In 2022, Reba Campbell set out to get off the screens and back to books for the summer. Her accountability was writing short Blink Book Reviews (so short you can read them in a blink). Now it’s an annual summer thing here. Join Reba’s Blink Book Review Facebook group to follow along. Reba is president of Columbia, SC-based The Medway Group and can be reached at reba@themedwaygroup.com.

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