Land of Last Chances

Jeanne Bridgeton, an unmarried executive in her late forties, discovers life doesn''t begin and end on a spreadsheet when her expected menopause instead becomes an unexpected pregnancy. Though accomplished at managing risk professionally, Jeanne realizes her skills don''t extend to her personal life, where she has allowed the professional and the personal to become intertwined. She''s not even sure which of two men in her life is the father. Worse yet, a previously undisclosed family secret reveals that she may carry a rare hereditary gene for early-onset Alzheimer''s--and it''s too late to get genetic tests. This leaves Jeanne to cope with her intense fear of risk without the aid of the mountain of data she''s accustomed to relying upon. Wrestling with the question of whether her own needs, or those of her child, should prevail takes Jeanne on an intensely emotional journey--one that ultimately leads to growth and enlightenment.

Originally from Mount Vernon, New York, Joan Cohen received her BA from Cornell University and her MBA from New York University. Her career in sales and marketing at technology companies led to the executive level, and after retirement she returned to school for an MFA in Writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts. She is the author of the novel Land of Last Chances, published in 2019. She now resides in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, in the Berkshires, with her husband and latest canine addition.