Surviving Female Friendships: The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Married men live longer than single men. That's a fact. But marriage doesn't seem to play a role in women's life expectancy. However, women with strong, long-lasting female social relationships are likely to live years longer than those without. If you rely on your female friends to help you decide what to wear to land the perfect job, advise you how to get your newborn to sleep at 3 a.m., confide in you with their closest secrets, that not only improves the quality of your life, but also the longevity of it. So why, then, is that friend so hard to find? And why is she so hard to keep these days? As the second decade of the 21st Century accelerates full speed ahead, more and more women are finding that their fast-paced lifestyles are leaving important casualties in their wakes-especially friendships. Increasingly, women bemoan learning of friends' engagements on Facebook rather than in-person or by telephone. Or they may experience the dull ache of being texted pictures from an event they weren't invited to. Nicole Zangara has learned much about women who find building and maintaining satisfying lasting friendships in today's increasingly-digital age more difficult than ever. As communications become more impersonal, real interaction often becomes more infrequent; and women, in particular, must work harder than ever to nurture and protect important friendships. There is no fault, no intent, behind the electronic apathy and other modern-day forces which can separate friends from one another, but the challenges still remain. With an eclectic mix of personal experiences from her own life, plus stories shared by a diverse group of women of all ages, Nicole Zangara presents a highly entertaining, funny, poignant, and thoroughly illuminating look at female friendships in the modern age. Her goal is both to educate and inspire, and to tear down any fears women may have about building the important friendships needed to make life so much more enjoyable.