KEY POINTS:
There used to be certain assumptions you could safely make about a chick-lit heroine: she'd be young, she'd be single (and looking), she'd be working in some menial role in a groovy industry such as media or publishing, and she'd be blonde (even the brunette heroines were blonde at some core level).
But chick lit has been around a while now, and its audience has grown up a bit. So the genre has been forced to change a lot of those conventions to the point where now there is only one assumption you can make about a chick-lit heroine: she'll be 30. At least.
The chick lit heroine - and her reader - used to be 20-something and her concerns were those of that age group: finding love, losing weight, living happily ever after. Now she (and we) have got a bit older and happy ever after looks more complicated. Today's chick lit heroines often deal with issues around fertility or raising children, they need to face their own mortality and often they're losing love rather than finding it.
Children, in fact, are such a common riff in today's chick lit there's a whole sub genre of hen lit.
Take the predictable Momzillas by Jill Kargman (HarperCollins, $24.99) where 32-year-old Hannah Allen is facing the rigours of competitive child rearing on New York's upper east side - this is Sex and the City plus a pram, sparky and light but pretty forgettable.
Or there's the slightly more subversive Any Way you Want Me by Lucy Diamond (Macmillan, $25); Sadie's the mother of two and lives with her long-term partner, only it's not enough.
She creates an online alter ego for harmless fun, only her attempt to be something she's not starts to threaten the life she has.
Jo Morgan, the heroine of Self Preservation Society by Kate Harrison (Hachette Livre, $36.99) also wants to change her status quo: she's spent her life avoiding risk but after a head injury she's decided life's too short. This is probably my pick of recent chick lit. It contains all the basic elements of the genre - a heroine, a few hot men, some humour - but somehow Harrison adds it together to make something a little bit more, a sweet and poignant story.
A bit too sweet though is the verging-on-toothless Going Dutch by Katie Fforde (Random House, $36.99). This is about relationships ending rather than beginning: Dora (who's a bit young for this modern wave of chick lit at 20-something) has run out on her staid boyfriend and planned wedding, to stay with 40-something Jo, who's fled to stay on a friend's house boat after she was left by her husband Philip. Pleasant but you forget the story as you read it and can predict the ending from the cover.
Barefoot by Elin Hilderbrand (Hachette Livre, $36.99) is more engaging; Vicki's a mother of two facing cancer, her sister Brenda's just lost her job, and her best friend Melanie's pregnant after years of struggle but has also found out her husband is having an affair. The story of the three women's summer at the beach is harder work - not exactly dense writing but you'll be more challenged than by Dora and Jo's barge antic. It's quite a good yarn if you want something with a bit more emotional meat.
- Detours, HoS
