The brainy literary web site for mother's, Literary Mama, just released a lengthy review of my book, A Suburban Mom: Notes from the Asylum, my collection of humor columns which inspired this blog.
Reviewer Heather Hudson wrote:
"Writing about challenges with children is tougher than it seems. Ignore the universality of a situation and the stories become self-indulgent and better suited to the family scrapbook. Go too deep and you risk alienating readers who are simply looking for a little escape and camaraderie over a cup of coffee. There is a fine balance.
One writer who comes close to finding the right mix of angst and humor is Meredith O'Brien. In her book, A Suburban Mom: Notes from the Asylum, a collection of columns written when she was raising three children (including twins) under five, she provides quick-and-dirty snapshots into her efforts to parent conscientiously through incessant demands
. . . In this collection, O'Brien adroitly handles the balance between relating what could have been tedious anecdotes about the specific frustrations and joys that come with three young children and offering a universal message. With essay titles like 'The Scrapbooking Cult' and 'To Yell, Perchance to Scream,' it's easy to picture O'Brien as one of your funniest friends, the one who can make you laugh through your tears and shore you up with the all-important validation that you're not alone."
Image credit: Literary Mama.
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