With Or Without You (Red Dress Ink)

In her most accomplished and entertaining novel to date, Carole Matthews takes her London-weary heroine on a life-changing trek through the Himalayas, where she ponders the meaning of such concepts as success, love, family -- and even civilization. After her live-in boyfriend extraordinaire, Jake, dumps her for a type-A Angelina Jolie look-a-like who climbs Mt. Everest, Lyssa Allen decides maybe a little adventure of her own can win him back. Leaving hair dryer, lattes and dreams of babies behind, this funny, neurotic and tougher-than-she-thought London editor sets off for Nepal, to the envy of her all-too-fertile sister. Her month-long sojourn in the East teaches Lyssa that maybe her horizons are bigger than she knew -- and the man of her dreams far different than she thought. Even her ideas about children undergo a change, and she gains a new perspective on her former obsession with having a baby. As her eyes are opened by her handsome and serene American tour guide, Lyssa wonders if she can ever return to her old life. When it's time to go home, she has the chance to find out . . . and faces the hardest decision of her life.