A hilarious, confrontational and moving story of one woman''s attempts to navigate her way through the challenges of mid-life, for lovers of HOW TO BE A WOMAN and I''M NOT WITH THE BAND. ''Claire Dederer is not only a brilliant author, but an honest and brave one'' Elizabeth Gilbert, author of EAT, PRAY, LOVEClaire Dederer''s youth was wild, an endless cascade of beer and rock and acid and sex that left her benumbed and adrift. But then, after two decades of disciplined transformation, she''d become a successful writer, a faithful wife, and a mother - a real adult. That is, until one morning at 44, she found herself overcome by the same sexual cravings and ineffable sadness of her younger years. The hedonistic girl, ''that crazy bitch'', was back - or had she never left?Frank and disarming, seductive and hilarious, Love and Trouble: A Mid-life Reckoning is Dederer''s attempt to reckon with those urges, and to reconcile the girl she''d been with the woman she''s become.