Description
Book SynopsisTrade Review"
The M Word: Conversations about Motherhood, a powerful, female-driven anthology of short personal essays, poems, and illustrations, tells the many stories women so rarely share. ...
The M Word is a meditation on the fickle emotional uncertainty awarded to mothers. It breaks down the walls of maternal isolation and offers companionship to anyone who has not had the fairy-tale journey to motherhood. These stories show us that the extraordinary gift of motherhood cannot be accepted without relinquishing something spectacular." -- Rachel Harry *
National Post *
"That's what makes
The M Word so surprising, and also moving, gripping, funny, and, occasionally, really uncomfortable to read: the writers put it all on the table, all the confusion, ambivalence, difficulty, suffering, hope, despair, and insight that swirl around people's different experiences with motherhood, whether they are or aren't mothers, however motherhood is defined, and whether their situation arose from choice or accident, gift or tragedy. As many of the writers observe, there's a popular public story about motherhood that is all bliss, smiles, and cuddles. For many of them, there is plenty of bliss, but that's rarely the whole story and often not the story at all.
The M Word doesn't try to tell one story: it allows, even insists, on the coexistence of many different ones." *
Open Letters Monthly *
"There is a strong Canadian tradition of public discourse on motherhood, from the late journalist June Callwood's interviews with unwed teenaged mothers to Marni Jackson's memoirs, and anthologies like
Double Lives and
Between Interruptions.
The M Word adds 25 thoughtful voices to the mix ... You won't keep this book; you'll pass it on to friends whose current vocation is changing diapers, or to friends who want a child, and those who don't." *
Herizons *
"A book about motherhood that includes those who never gave birth? Those who've been pregnant but never held a child? Halleluiah! Finally: a conversation with no 'us versus them.' Here is only 'us,' those who desire to 'be connected by this understanding of what it is to love and celebrate your children.'
The M Word offers what mothers (new and old) need most: to know we're not alone." *
Winnipeg Review *
"Stop everything. Withhold judgement for a minute. I promise you
The M Word is not like any book you've read about motherhood." *
The Fernie Fix *
"Rather than attempting to resolve issues once and for all, or to glorify and idealize a madonna-like figure,
The M Word presents in alphabetical order a wide variety of the experiences of women who have embraced, eschewed or endured the experiences of motherhood in its many, different realities ... This book was a pleasure to read." *
Kitchener-Waterloo Record *
"
The M Word felt like a kind of emotional labour for the three days I was reading. This is a motherlode of deeply personal truths, generous and courageous souls, bearing witness to lives shaped, if not defined, by, well, 'life with a uterus,' as the foreword suggests." *
Telegraph-Journal *
"I'm not normally drawn to mothering books but I like Kerry Clare's work, so it was impossible not to be drawn to her anthology,
The M Word: Conversations about Motherhood, I knew I'd be in the hands of good taste and good writing, even if, as a Childless Woman, I couldn't actually relate. Well, what happened was this: I found myself not only enjoying the read, but relating. In a major way. Because, as it turns out, the essays are both about mothering and not mothering, about the exultant and the reluctant, the non-mothers by choice, the stepmothers by circumstance, women who will do anything to become a mother and those who will do anything to not. and in every scenario, the difficulties, joys, fears, the way life is changed for the better and sometimes for the not entirely better. There are celebrations, regrets, and such honesty that it's really quite impossible not to relate." -- Matilda Magtree
"
The M Word is a book I would have benefited from reading when I was a young mother more than 30 years ago." *
Coastal Spectator *
