Escape by Barbara Delinksy

Escape by Barbara Delinsky

"Have you ever woken up in a cold sweat, thinking that you've taken a wrong turn and are stuck in a life you don't want?"

Thus begins Escape by Barbara Delinsky. Emily a thirty-two year old lawyer, who along with her attorney husband, is on a fast-track to achieve a dream they shared when they meet in college. When she awakes to the start of another hectic day she wonders if people dream of "hitting the brakes, backing up, and heading elsewhere," possibly reinventing or rediscovering themselves, possibly going back to an old lover. The morning starts badly when she receives a text message from her husband informing her he can not attend an important firm dinner with her that evening.

Things get worse, until Emily has a melt-down at work and impulsively decides to escape. She has no clear idea where she will go or what she will be doing, making packing for her impromptu trip a bit of a problem. Escape is a recurring theme throughout the novel, not just Emily's escape, but for other characters as well. Jude, the old lover, escaped a confining life, or used his escape as a way to run from problems he did not wish to solve. Recurring dreams about coyotes eventually lead Emily back to a town where she spent a summer and met Jude.

After escaping New York city, when her thinking clears, nerves calm down, she believes that summer may be where she took a wrong turn, creating the life she was stuck in and maybe did not want.

Barbara Delinsky has nine other published novels, some on the New York Times bestseller list.  Her writing style makes for easy reading and Escape mostly held my attention throughout. It did not turn out to be the type of novel I expected, which was something more supernatural or otherworldly. It was more about marriage, motherhood and relationships. My favorite quote from Escape is what Emily's mother told her: Tombstones don't list jobs; they list relationships...".

308 pages copyright 2011 published by Doubleday division of Random House, Inc.
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