Jealousy is an evil word. It is an emotion that gnaws away inside, souring relationships, and if it is not controlled can ruin your life. When Nancy Friday discovered her own strong feelings of jealousy she was shocked. But she found that she was not alone, and that jealousy is at the heart of family life and the core of many relationships. Friday used her own experiences and those of many men and women to strip bare this multi-faceted emotion. Confronting the reasons why you feel so bitter when, for instance, a friend lands the job you've always wanted, your mother confides in your sister rather than you, you fear your partner has been seeing someone else or a baby is born and disrupts your family life, she enables us to recognize that jealousy is a misery we inflict upon ourselves - and it needn't control us.