Radio Talk Show Host Talks About Her New Book

Lisa Wexler was interviewing Congressman Jim Himes live on her afternoon radio talk show recently when she demanded to know why the Obama Administration has not shut down all offshore oil rigs for safety audits in light of the ongoing BP catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico.

What followed was like a chapter out of her new book, Secrets of a Jewish Mother.

Wexler dismissed Himes' response -- that the U.S. Government lacks the capability to go out and check every rig to determine its potential for leaks -- as unsatisfactory on the air. No sooner was the segment over than the telephone in Wexler's studio at 1400 WSTC/1350 WNLK rang.

The caller was Wexler's mother, Gloria Kamen, her most devoted fan. Kamen had tuned in to listen to the radio show on her computer from her home in Boca Ratan, Florida, as is her daily custom.

"Mommy says to me, 'You didn't see '60 Minutes'"? Wexler related in an interview with Patch.

Kamen, equally fired up over the BP calamity, fed Wexler the tip that the CBS program had just aired a piece with new whistleblower revelations about BP, Wexler said.

Wexler took the cue from her mother, investigated further, and pronounced Himes' response even more unsatisfactory the next day on her radio show.

"I'm really agitated about this one," Wexler said.

Wexler and her mother see eye-to-eye on everything that matters - family love, values and loyalty - and almost everything else. They talk on the phone daily and Kamen has even been a guest on Wexler's radio show.

"She's a popular guest," Wexler says affectionately. "It's her energy, she's very direct, very funny, very opinionated."

In other words, an older version of herself.

And while Wexler's new book's title is Secrets of a Jewish Mother, it's a play on words because it's really about three Jewish mothers - herself, Kamen and her sister Jill Zarin, a star of the Bravo cable TV series "The Real Housewives of New York" - and their unusually close-knit relationship.

(Lest Kamen be accused of inciting sibling rivalry, she has also appeared as Zarin's guest on "Real Housewives" and was so popular she was asked to contribute an online advice column.)

Wexler's book is indeed full of secrets.

Such as how Wexler came to skip her senior year in high school to enroll at Johns Hopkins University (an unusual telephone call to the admissions office by Kamen), which of them had breast reduction surgery (that would be Jill), and how to keep a man after you're married ("Who said your husband has to know everything?"). It even has Wexler's secret recipe for chicken soup with matzoh balls ("Be warned: this takes two days").

Wexler wrote the framework of the book, published by Dutton this year, but each chapter has personal, even intimate comments penned by Kamen and Zarin. There are chapters on friendship, dating, beauty and health, education, career, marriage, money and parenting.

It is a recipe book for success and happiness for a woman who is Jewish, and it even has a glossary of the Yiddish terms sprinkled throughout the book, but the lessons can apply to everyone.

"As you now know," she writes at page 126, "the Jewish mother is matchmaker, but not only for people. We are always making connections, and one of the most important is connecting someone's natural talents with a career that would allow those talents to flourish."

Wexler is a co-founder of Women in Power, a group of local women who convene at the Women's Club of Westport to network and lead panel discussions on women and careers and balancing careers with family obligations.

"We are really just trying to figure out how to keep our families in reasonably good shape while preventing our brains from dissolving into mush" is one of the book's passages on balancing traditional roles of motherhood with career aspirations.

Wexler is a pro in the balancing act department. After practicing law for 20 years, during which she and her husband raised two children, Wexler had grown to resent the law.

"I started thinking to myself, Why should I spend my time solving your problems?" she writes. "You created them, you solve them."

As the children's chauffeur, she found herself talking back to talk radio and thought she could be a better host than the ones she listened to.

Taking time out to study at the Connecticut School of Broadcasting, she soon landed positions at the Yale University radio and moved on to Cox's 1400 WSTC/1350 WNLK, where the show airs live Monday to Friday from 4 to 6 in the afternoon.

She's won the Gold Coast Best Radio Personality award in 2009 and she's just returned from Los Angeles where she was a recipient of the American Women in Radio and Television 2010 "Gracie" award in the "outstanding talk show -news" category.

She interviewed Gov. M. Jodi Rell on her first show and ever since has been using the radio talk platform to "try to counter the dumbing-down of America" and be an opinionated bridge between commercial radio and National Public Radio.

"As a child I was so listened to," she said. "I was raised to believe everything I said had an impact."

Talking to her Jewish mother gave Wexler the confidence to talk to an estimated 40-75,000 daily listeners, she says.

"I love it so much," she says expressively. "I'm finally doing what I was born to do."