Book
Look how happy I'm making you : stories / Polly Rosenwaike.
The women in Polly Rosenwaike's Look How Happy I'm Making You want to be mothers, or aren't sure they want to be mothers, or - having recently given birth - are overwhelmed by what they've wrought. Sharp and unsettling, wry and moving in its depiction of love, friendship, and family, this collection expands the coversation about what having a baby looks like. One woman struggling with infertility deals with the news that her sister is pregnant. Another, nervous about her biological clock, "forgets" to take her birth control while dating a younger man and must confront the possibility of becoming a single parent. Four motherless women who meet in a bar every Mother's Day contend with their losses and what it would mean to have a child. Witty, empathetic, and precisely observed, Look How Happy I'm Making You offers a rare, honest portrayal of pregnancy and new motherhood in a culture obsessed with women's most intimate choices.
Record details
- ISBN: 9780385544030
- Physical Description: 244 pages ; 20 cm
- Edition: First edition.
- Publisher: New York : Doubleday, 2019.
- Copyright: ©2019.
Content descriptions
| Formatted Contents Note: | Grow your eyelashes -- Field notes -- Period, ellipsis, full stop -- White carnations -- Tanglewood -- June -- The dissembler's guide to pregnancy -- Ten warning signs of postpartum depression -- Welcome to your family -- A lady who takes jokes -- Love bug, sweetie dear, pumpkin pie, etc. -- Parental fade. |
Search for related items by subject
| Subject: | Pregnancy > Fiction. Motherhood > Fiction. Fertility, Human > Fiction. |
| Genre: | Short stories. |
Show Only Available Copies
| Location | Call Number / Copy Notes | Barcode | Shelving Location | Holdable? | Status | Due Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gibsons Public Library | FIC ROSE (Text) | 30886001065156 | Adult Fiction Hardcover | Volume hold | Available | - |
| Creston Public Library | FIC ROS (Text)
Acquisition Type: New |
35140100052581 | Fiction | Volume hold | Available | - |
- Booklist Reviews : Booklist Reviews 2019 February #2
The 12 stories in Rosenwaike's debut collection capture the vast and intimate moments of motherhood and womanhood. Rosenwaike's characters are hopeful, struggling, and conflicted, and through their stories, she explores the ways that parenthood is not simply joy and sleeplessness. A woman who meets up with other motherless women every Mother's Day learns she is unexpectedly pregnant. A couple who never planned to have children decide to change their minds. After a year of an ambiguous relationship, a woman chooses to skip taking her birth-control pills. Two extended families gather for a newborn's first holiday season. A poet revisits her unrequited college love in the month before she gives birth. In each story, Rosenwaike's remarkable prose conjures emotions so effectively that readers will feel pulled into the characters' lives. While the stories are all connected by motherhood, each explores additional themes: changing friendships, aging, defining family, building a life, and more. Whether parents or not, readers who love short literary fiction will connect with Look How Happy I'm Making You. Copyright 2019 Booklist Reviews. - Kirkus Reviews : Kirkus Reviews 2018 December #2
This debut collection limns the inner lives of women who have just become, will soon be, decline to be, or long to be mothers. "You can't know the joy untilâ," says the teary-eyed mother of a woman who has just announced that she does not intend to have children, in an exchange tucked into "Grow Your Eyelashes," the opening story of Rosenwaike's empathetic collection. "You just can't know it." To this, the daughter replies, "Look how happy I'm making you." Ultimately, the young woman gets pregnant and decides to have the baby. However, "Grow Your Eyelashes" is not really her story but rather one told through the eyes of her sister, whose struggle with infertility is making her the very opposite of happy. The effect of babies (newborn, unborn) on the lives and emotions of parents (and those who long to be or decline to be parents) is at the heart of all 12 stories in this deeply resonant collection. In "Field Notes," a 30-year-old biologist connects with the inquisitive 9-year-old daughter of the receptionist at a research facility in which she works even as the biologist decides to terminate an unwanted pregnancy. In "Period, Ellipsis, Full Stop," a freelance book editor suffers a miscarriage and mulls the pursuit of perfection, the expectation of effortlessness: "As if you could set out to do something and get it right the first time, as if the whole of life wasn't about trying again." The push-pull of life and death, the tug of postpartum depression, the shame of deception, the guilt of separationâall are explored in these pages. "People say that a baby changes everything, but is that true?" Rosenwaike writes in "Parental Fade," a story about a couple embarking on the slow, painful process of sleep training. "Are we more patient or less? More generous or more selfish? More engaged with the world or more in retreat from it? More accepting of mortality or more frightened of dying?" These questions, considered here, are among the thin g s that may keep parents up at night. An exquisite collection that is candid, compassionate, and emotionally complex. Copyright Kirkus 2018 Kirkus/BPI Communications. All rights reserved. - Publishers Weekly Reviews : PW Reviews 2019 January #1
The 12 stories in Rosenwaike's striking debut collection portray women of childbearing age confronting the challenges of becoming, or not becoming, a mother. In "Grow Your Eyelashes," a web developer admires a baby on a bus while recalling her own fruitless efforts to get pregnant. Freelance editor Cora, of "Period, Ellipsis, Full Stop," has a miscarriage. In incisive language, Rosenwaike evokes the baby's miniature hands and swollen cheeks; the cavernous, windowless institute where Leah works; and Cora writing pleasant work emails despite her throbbing uterus. Longing and anxiety pervade "White Carnations" as four motherless, childless friends celebrate Mother's Day together, and "June," in which an expectant mother feels torn between her unborn daughter and dying aunt. Self-aware humor helps baby Alice's parents through her first Christmas/Hanukkah gathering in "Welcome to Your Family" and a wakeful infant's parents through the night in "Parental Fade." The road to parenthood is paved with denial in "The Dissembler's Guide to Pregnancy," resistance in "Ten Warning Signs of Postpartum Depression," and overwhelming affection in "Love Bug, Sweetie Dear, Pumpkin Pie, Etc." Rosenwaike's edgy stories are endearingly honest, excruciatingly detailed, and irresistibly intimate, expertly depicting what motherhood means to millennials.
Copyright 2019 Publishers Weekly.(Mar.)
