Divided Lives focuses on three extraordinary women - Meredith Vieira, a former correspondent working for CBS television's 60 Minutes and now at ABC; Rachael Worby, a conductor who is also the first lady of her state; and Dr. Alison Estabrook, the chief of breast surgery at the second largest hospital in the country.

Knowing that women's lives do not always conform to the neat configurations of theories and social critiques, Elsa Walsh sought out the "flesh and blood stories" of real women as they faced landmark choices, decisions, and conflicts in their professional and personal lives. The result is a moving and often startling work that demonstrates how universal our struggles really are despite the variations in our circumstances.

What is abundantly clear is that even in the lives of such successful women, the struggle with self-doubt and the conflicts between work and family that afflict the rest of us are still very much in force. And as Walsh poignantly concludes, if women with all the advantages are having trouble, then that says something important about the condition of women's lives overall.

In Divided Lives, Elsa Walsh reveals a central theme of contemporary life and offers the comfort of shared understanding to every woman who is striving for balance in her life.