Kate Long The Bad Mother's Handbook

The Bad Mother's Handbook

Kate Long

Ballantine, Jul 2006, $13.95

ISBN: 0345479661

In England though she recently broke up with her boyfriend, seventeen-year-old Charlotte feels good about herself and her future as she is doing well in school, lives in a relatively happy all female home, and seems adjusted. That is until she learns she is pregnant.

Her mom Karen is a teacher's aide struggling with her mother Nan's mind slowly slipping away with the demands from that side already overwhelming. Her patience is over the edge when Charlotte informs her she is pregnant. Upset and unable to contain her anger, Karen cannot believe that history has repeated itself because when she was sixteen she gave birth to Karen. Though she loves her daughter all her dreams died with her birth. She did marry the father but thankfully divorced that loser soon afterward. As Nan drifts deeper into the past including insisting that she adopted Karen, the mentally exhausted sandwich generation is not sure what to do as Charlotte decides to give birth except to flee in search of her biological mother dreaming of a loving comforting welcome.

This fascinating character study is at its best when the audience sees deep inside the three generations with deep understanding of being an unwed mother, a child having a child, the sandwich generation, and the creeping of dementia (as well as a late stroke). When the tale spins off into the biological mother twist it loses some of its depth until Karen returns to her "real" family. Somewhat a soap opera, THE BAD MOTHER'S HANDBOOK is a strong family drama that focuses on the demands and responsibilities on women without men.

Harriet Klausner