From London to NY, the merry-go-round called romance

Alice, the eldest at 38, is a lawyer who, despite a series of romantic disappointments, cherishes a vague hope that the right man may someday appear. Tina, 29, the youngest, waits for Mr. Right to come along, meanwhile toning her perfect body and sleeping with dozens of Mr. Wrongs. Isabel, the middle daughter, has been married for 12 years, and lately devotes all her energy to trying to conceive, even giving up her job as a veterinarian. But the harder she works at becoming a mother, the more her husband draws away.

''This Side of Married" is a lovely homage to the spirit of Jane Austen, a domestic comedy about love and betrayal, class and money, misapprehension and misunderstanding. The setting is 21st-century Philadelphia, but the issues are much the same as those that vexed the Bennet family in 18th-century Hertfordshire.

Dr. Rubin -- ''Doc" to her two elder daughters -- is a successful obstetrician/gynecologist and a well-meaning but domineering mother. She and her husband, Judge William Rubin, are celebrating their 40th-wedding anniversary with a big party. Doc has invited Anthony Wolf, a charming, good-looking cardiologist new to her practice. It's clear she intends him for Alice.

However, Anthony may not be the prize he appears to be. Other available men enter the story, complicating matters. Soren Zank, a half-Jewish, half-Swedish distant relation (''a cross between a Viking and a Hassid"), has made a fortune in Silicon Valley and seems to have designs of one sort or another on all three Rubin sisters. And Marco Pena, the Rubins' handsome young gardener, shares a passion for salsa dancing, and perhaps something more, with Alice.

Pastan's prose is low-key and precise, and she gives her characters some witty dialogue. ''Plenty of people seem to manage love just fine outside the confines of marriage," Isabel tells Anthony's friend Simon. ''Confines of marriage," he repeats, ''there's a phrase for you."

Jane Green is a best-selling British chick-lit author. Her sixth novel, ''To Have and to Hold," reads as though she cranked it out as quickly as possible and never once looked back to see if it was working. There may be a story in there, somewhere, but it's buried under a rubbish heap of upscale names, posh settings, plastic characters, loose plot ends, and boring, pointless dialogue.