Praise for In the Family Way
"Laney Katz Becker’s latest is chock full of eye-opening reminders of how far women have come since the days when subversive texts like The Feminine Mystique were passed around like contraband. Set in the 1960s, the novel features a delightful cast of characters that you can’t help but fall in love with, and the book’s themes of female autonomy and reproductive freedom are just as potent today, if not more so. A powerful tale, well told."
— Fiona Davis, New York Times bestselling author of The Stolen Queen
"In the Family Way bursts with the complexity, drama, and warmth of Call the Midwife, but set at the canasta and kitchen tables of 1960s suburban America. This timely, timeless novel captures not only the reproductive horrors of that era but also political awakening and a kind of nostalgic hope: it's a changing world, and Roe, behind us now, was glimmering on the horizon then. Laney Katz Becker so beautifully reveals that where there are women's hardships, there is consolation to be found, then and still, in each other's company and care."
— Catherine Newman, New York Times bestselling author of Sandwich
“The history of ‘housewives’ – everything that goes on behind the Welcome! Mat – comes alive in Laney Katz Becker's powerful novel, In the Family Way, a poignant, rich, deeply textured tale of women, friendship, and struggles amid 1960s suburbia on the precipice of change. The novel is both an inspiring and gut-wrenching page-turner filled with suburban angst -- what we see and what we don’t…If you love books about resilience, the power of friendship, and second chances -- run, don’t walk, grab this one!”
– Lisa Barr, New York Times bestselling author of Woman on Fire and The Goddess of Warsaw
“Delightful and inspiring…an engaging story of women’s friendship in the 1960s…[A] reminder of how limited women’s lives were—we needed men to co-sign for loans and credit cards; we had to give up the limited jobs available to us upon becoming pregnant; and woe betide the unmarried girl who becomes pregnant when abortions were illegal and dangerous…it sends an important warning shot about how easily restrictions on women’s lives might return, and indeed are.”
Meg Waite Clayton, International bestselling author of Typewriter Beach and The Postmistress of Paris
"With the assault on reproductive rights, this historical novel set in the 1960s is timelier than ever. The women in these pages—feisty, fierce, and fragile—offer a peek behind the curtain of the precariousness of women's rights and womanhood itself. At the same time, this novel is a potent reminder that women throughout history and into the future will continue to survive by doing what we have always done—take care of each other. We need stories that illuminate the enduring power of that particular spirit of sisterhood, which is what In The Family Way accomplishes so beautifully and with such inspiration."
Christine Pride, author of All the Men I’ve Loved Again and co-author of We Are Not Like Them (a GMA book club pick)
Praise for Laney’s previous novel
Dear Stranger, Dearest Friend
“…Becker, who captures perfectly the strangely personal, chatty tone of an online relationship, never lets us doubt the tenderness of their connection. We truly feel as if we are eavesdropping on a blossoming friendship.”
— Redbook Magazine
“Our booksellers found it ‘touching’…a ‘particularly poignant’ journal of friendship…a ‘forceful, honest’ book…’a great read’…”
–– The Barnes and Noble Booksellers Guide to New Fiction
“I knew someone would write a novel in e-mails. Luckily, Laney Katz Becker has done it with so much warmth and humor that I’ll never curse this means of communication as impersonal again…this is good!”
–– Literary Guild
“…[an] information packed story…The characters feel real and provide insight into the lot of cancer patients…recommended for public libraries.”
–– Library Journal
“[An] earnest, appealing debut novel…thanks to Becker’s ability to create e-mail that defines each protagonist’s personality…informative, realistic tale of the evolution of a friendship.”
— Publisher’s Weekly
“I would recommend Dear Stranger, Dearest Friend to any reader –this is the sort of book that Oprah should really push if she is interested in helping women find really compelling, interesting and well-written reading material…Dear Stranger, Dearest Friend is sure to tug at your heart and boggle your mind with its intensity and richness.”
–– Bookreporter.com
“[An] info-novel about breast cancer and close friendship…informative.”
–– Kirkus Reviews