So Much for That »

Novelist and journalist Lionel Shriver won the coveted Orange Prize in 2005 for We Need to Talk about Kevin, a gripping literary page-turner that delves into the tragic possibilities of motherhood gone awry. Her features, op-eds, and reviews have appeared in such publications as The Guardian, The New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Financial Times, and the Economist.

FROM THE ACCLAIMED AUTHOR OF THE NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER THE POST-BIRTHDAY WORLD COMES A SEARING, RUTHLESSLY HONEST NEW NOVEL ABOUT A MARRIAGE BOTH STRESSED AND STRENGTHENED BY THE DEMANDS OF SERIOUS ILLNESS.

Shep Knacker has long saved for "The Afterlife": an idyllic retreat to the Third World where his nest egg can last forever. Traffic jams on the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway will be replaced with "talking, thinking, seeing, and being" and enough sleep.

When he sells his home repair business for a cool million dollars, his dream finally seems within reach. Yet Glynis, his wife of twenty-six years, has concocted endless excuses why it's never the right time to go. Weary of working as a peon for the jerk who bought his company, Shep announces he's leaving for a Tanzanian island, with or without her.

Just returned from a doctor's appointment, Glynis has some news of her own: Shep can't go anywhere because she desperately needs his health insurance.

But their...

The Barnes & Noble Review

The cost of catastrophic illness is universally measured in the emotional toll it takes as a loved one sickens and dies. But in 21^st-century America it is also measured in dollars and cents. Lionel Shriver's pointed and poignant new novel, So Much for That, is about not just Glynis Knacker's battle with mesothelioma and its effect on friends and family, but also about the financial and medical excesses of the American health care system.