Rating: 
Summary: More Entitlement Whining
Review: One of the problems that stems from being born and raised here in America is the feeling of "Entitlement," a.k.a. "The Having-It-All Fantasy". People, especially the women Hewlett polled for this book, need to realize that life is about making choices. The constitution affords life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. It does not say that all women are guaranteed a position at a Fortune 500 company while simultaneously trying to care for a small child. Hewlett glosses over the fact that working mothers with children take more time off; leaving other, childfree, co-workers to pick up the slack. Companies need employees who are able to fullfill the committments of the job they were hired for, especially those in top management positions. What I want to know is, if childrearing is such a life-changing and fullfilling experience, why are mothers anxious to work outside the home? And if motherhood is "The Hardest Job in the World", why do they insist on having a corporate job as well? Life is about choices. You make your choices based on your priorities. J.N. Riley- a "childfree by choice" woman
Rating: 
Summary: Let's redefine "having it all"
Review: This book has a lot to offer. First, Hewlett gave her background as a career woman and why she IS qualified to speak as a mother. Though she was able to have a child at the age of 51, she went through miscarriages and a lot of medical expense to do so. She points out that for many women it's not easy or financially feasible to wait until your forties or fifties, and women should know this. I read articles on independent medical websites about the struggles and risks of having children after age 40. To those who know people who have been successful, good for them. But the websites and fertility clinics are reporting that most women don't have it that easy. Pregnancy rates are 4 out of 10 women among 20-somethings, but it drops to 1 out of 10 women among 40-somethings. It's not as common as it may seem.
Giving people knowledge is NOT a scare-tactic. We women deserve to be informed! It should not be hidden information just because some women are uncomfortable with it or believe that it does not apply in their case.
I have to argue with the idea of "having it all." One of my colleagues used to say, "I can do anything, one thing at a time." Males and females sometimes make the mistake of trying to have high-powered, demanding careers while at the same time undertaking the high-powered, demanding responsibility of being a parent of young children. I agree with the suggestion of having children early on, then working on your career afterwards. You can probably have it all - ONE THING AT A TIME.
Even hard-working fathers make sacrificies, although Hewlett apparently does not notice. Fathers sacrifice by not spending as much time with their children as they would like, having wives who divorce them and move away with the kids, or having two, three, or four unsuccessful marriages. This book makes it seem that men really "have it all," when they don't. She even gives exampls of men who don't live with their children or who have been remarried. She says about one man, "At least he has children." However, life is not about breeding children then feeling like you accomplished something because "at least I had children." He was regretful over the sacrifice he had made putting career before family, as many women are regretful.
I would consider being a successful parent and having a FULFILLING (not perfect) career to be the definition of "having it all," even if I relinquish all chances of ever having the corner office or partnership in the firm or the opportunity to travel around the world just a few more times. Women (or men) who leave the workforce to raise children would do well to rethink their thinking. Being flexible at how you define your goals and your happiness is better than feeling hopeless, pitiful, and unchallenged.
Rating:
Summary: If you want baby, easy!
Review: The world is over-populated. Please be open and learn from the Europeans: adopt desserted babies in South America, Asia, Africa and now one more source (caused by the American government): Iraq. Empty middle-age? So much to busy with! Be a loving person.
Rating: 
Summary: Influential but flawed
Review: This book has many biases and flaws. Other reviewers have already gone into detail on these points, so I won't belabor them. I gave this book 2 stars because it created huge waves when released: was the subject of many magazine articles and television shows in the following months. So, if you are like me and enjoy keeping on top of books that have helped shape the news, note that this was one of the most most talked-about books of 2002. That being said, my other point is this: there is a business in making people scared and prophesizing doom and gloom. Does a woman's fertility decline as she ages? Sure. But it varies wildly from person to person. Do you really want to put your money towards trying to scare the wits out of high acheiving North American women, making them feel even more pressured than they already do? I, for one, would rather not.
Rating: 
Summary: We need to overthrow patriarchy: change job schedules
Review: This is a good survey that show us the problems we are facing because of patriarchy. The problems we, professional women, face is how to manage work and family, which as a consequence also affect men. And Why is this? well in part because under patriarchy these job schedules were designed for men to work outside home and women to stay at home taking care of the family, and since women earned participation in men's world, society allowed them this under the male rule. This means that this survey invites us to see that we need reforms in our workplace, and need as some authors suggest to work to overthrow patirarchy, the ancient system where everything was made to serve males. So the problem is that women have gained participation in men's world but under male rule. We need to change this, and one thing to start is by changing job schedules, so both men and women can enjoy work and family. Recent statistics show the trend of women going to work outside home, and an increasing number of stay-at home dads. Why is this? Because of patriarchy, and because someone has to take care of our family. That is a reality of life, we grow and want to have a husband/wife and children, and this requires to take care of them which requires to have time to do it.
Rating:
Summary: An eye-opener
Review: Yes, some things are best pursued during young adulthood - college education, career building, baby-making. Hewlett's research makes that point, and it alone is worth two stars. But from this, she makes at least two faulty conclusions: (1) Her high-achieving childless female subjects were too stupid to figure this out until they hit 40. (2) Since men can "have it all", women are entitled to the same. Obviously, our options will diminish over time. And it follows that no one - male or female - can have everything, regardless of how someone's life might look on the surface. Life involves trade-offs. In this book, Hewlett responds to her interviewees as objects of pity rather than recipients of immense blessing. To have health, freedom, and success is far more than most people have in this world - especially women - and is certainly nothing to snivel about. Hewlett's own story in the Preface about her obessession with bearing a FOURTH child after age 45 along with other stories of the huge self-indulgent waste of time and money on ineffective infertility treatments was enough to make me want to close this book many times while reading it. Can't these women find more important things to worry about? The adage "Count your blessings before you count your troubles" apparently never occurred to anyone in the small, yet largely biased sample of workaholic women. Also she makes a rather naive - if not irritating - criticism about people being single because they are "unprepared to make the sacrifices necessary to share a life with someone else." Hewlett has been married for over two decades, through life in the '80s and '90s. How current is her knowledge of what those "sacrifices" might be? For example, is she aware that heterosexual women are the fastest growing HIV/AIDS population, yet most those women are/were married?
| 
