Brenda Janowitz's "Recipe for a Happy Life"

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Brenda Janowitz attended Cornell University and Hofstra Law School, where she was a member of the Law Review and won the Law Review Writing Competition. Janowitz has worked as a lawyer, and as a career counselor at two New York City law schools. Her books include Jack with a Twist and Scot on the Rocks.

Her new novel, Recipe for a Happy Life, is about three generations of women with a culture all their own. When Hannah finds herself spending the summer with her glamorous grandmother, a widow six times over, at her sprawling beach-front Hamptons estate, she learns that there’s more than one recipe for happiness.

A story of mothers and daughters, grandmothers and grandchildren, Recipe for a Happy Life is a quirky story about correcting the mistakes from your past and trying to create a future for yourself.

Here Janowitz dreamcasts an adaptation of Recipe for a Happy Life:

Oooh, this one’s tough, because one of the main characters in the book is a 76 year old grandmother, and there aren’t exactly a ton of 76 year-old grandmothers running around. Or, if there are, we don’t get to see them that often. Hollywood likes ‘em young, I think.

I think Joan Collins would be perfect to play the part of Hannah’s grandmother, Vivienne, the glamorous widow six times over, but my editor likes Shirley MacLaine. (Joan, Shirley, call me!)

The granddaughter, Hannah, is at a place in her life where she’s really lost. We’d need an actress who could really express that—the sense of loss, the sense of not knowing who she is or where she’s going.

There are so many talented actresses I love: Natalie Portman, Gwyneth Paltrow, Jennifer Garner, Drew Barrymore. Each would bring something really special to the story.

Learn more about the book and author at Brenda Janowitz's website.

--Marshal Zeringue