Lara Lillibridge On Writing Mama, Mama, Only Mama Lara Lillibridge on her memoir, Mama, Mama, Only Mama: An Irreverent Guide for the Newly Single Parent—from Divorce and Dating to Cooking and Crafting, All While Raising the Kids and Maintaining Your Own Sanity (Sort Of). (Skyhorse, May 2019) Being a single mother means relaxing your cleanliness standards. A lot. Being a single mother means missing your kids like crazy when your ex has them, only to want to give them back ten minutes after they come home. Being a single mother means accepting sleep deprivation as a…
Author: Mom Egg Review
Squeaky Wheels: Travels with my Daughter by Train, Plane, Metro, Tuk-tuk and Wheelchair by Suzanne Kamata Review by Lara Lillibridge Suzanne Kamata grew up in Grand Haven, Michigan. She went to Japan to teach English, fell in love, and married a Japanese man. She gave birth to micro-preemie twins, one of whom was deaf and had cerebral palsy. Kamata recounts her struggles in learning to support and advocate for her daughter, while fostering independence at the same time. She writes about her first overseas travels to the US, and local trips around Japan. Kamata received a grant to…
Review by Barbara Ellen Sorensen A definitive theme in Margo Taft Stever’s new volume of poetry, Cracked Piano, is the mercurial role of mothers. That motherhood is both a terrifying and transcendent time in many women’s lives is not lost on Stever. Over and over, the poet sketches images of women who don’t just model binary traits of good and bad but who are fully realized human beings. Children and infants inhabit the poems as well and motherhood is filled with the vestiges of childhood from eating animal crackers to feeding puppies. These are unfailingly light images embedded in…
Review by Carole Mertz Maggie Nelson centered her Bluets around its “blue” theme and Inger Christensen around the alphabet. In her book Pansies, Carol Barrett shaped her vignettes around the personality and culture of an Apostolic Lutheran babysitter. Teenage babysitter Abigail is hired to care for the author’s child Sarah. This collection conveys a profile of the babysitter and of how her character influenced the author’s family. For the writing of Pansies, Barrett, a clinical psychologist, received the support of two grants, one a GAP grant from the State of Washington, the other from Union Institute & University. As a…
Review by Lara Lillibridge “One word. One breathless syllable, as steady, as fragile, as a hinge. Try to say it softly. If… The sound lingers, the weight of the word hovers.” (75) Deborah Batterman’s novel, just like february, is filled with lyrical prose in this coming of age story. As the story begins, we join Rachel in watching the dynamics between her Vietnam veteran father and anti-war mother as they prepare to finally wed. Her grandmother—the family matriarch—adds her own drama to the occasion, and we meet the rest of the quirky siblings. Rachel is often relegated to the role…
Review by Barbara Lawhorn Two and a half years ago, I found myself questioning my identity in the face of a marital separation. Larger than the question of who I was beyond being a wife, was the deeper interrogation of who I was when my children were gone. Since their births, the contours of my life have been shaped and sanded by their astounding existence. I knew I was a writer, and a teacher, but shared custody initially left me reeling in a house too quiet and too empty. Mothers Without Their Children, edited by Charlotte Beyer and Andrea Lee…
Happy Mother’s Day! On Mother’s Day, MER celebrates all aspects of “mother”–the noun (“a mother’) but also the verb (“to mother”), and, for that matter, adjective and adverb. Wishing all who mother in any way a beautiful day! French artist Camille Aubry’s astute graphic art depicts the dawn of the mothering experience. Joetta Maue’s art references stages of motherhood and mothers’ work. Laura Foley’s poem evokes the joy of grand-mothering. Laura Foley – Poetry Camille Aubry – A Journey to Motherhood Joetta Maue – Art
Camille Aubry – A Journey to Motherhood Artist’s Statement I am a French illustrator and cartoonist based in Bristol, UK. I explore the subject of motherhood in my artwork, and more particularly through my comic book A Journey to Motherhood. The project was this year long listed for the Laydeez Do Comics Prize. As a side project to this long form graphic novel, my self-published book of cartoons Toddler Moments was selected as part of the April line-up for the Laydeez do Comics event where I was invited to present the project to the public. The book was recently reviewed…
Joetta Maue Artist Statement As an artist I have utilized my daily life as muse; my work inevitably reflects this, therefore, as I became a mother my work explored and continues to explore this complex relationship and landscape. Through motherhood I began to explore the psychological landscape of the domestic space through various media. Zooming in, slowing down, creating labor in the small seemingly insignificant moments is an attempt to bring awareness and attention to the glimpses, touches, and objects that create our daily experience. Through my labor intensive drawings. embroideries and the witness of my camera I invite the…
Laura Foley Camden, Maine The winter loons find harbor here, as do I, my child’s child walking slowly with me down the street, her tiny hand like an anchor in mine. She bids hello to water, to sunlight on the water, to the river beneath the little bridge, to the strange man passing— who stops and waves, basking in her favor. No one racing, this quiet Sunday morning— except time’s thoroughbred waters, galloping to the sea. Laura Foley’s seventh collection of poetry, Why I Never Finished My Dissertation, is due out in September 2019. Her work has…