A Life's Work: On Becoming a Mother

A Life's Work: On Becoming a Mother
by Rachel Cusk

A Life's Work: On Becoming a Mother
List Price: $16.00
Our Price: $3.42
You Save: $12.58 (79%)
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Buy Used: from $0.02 (click here)
Category: Book
See more book details and other editions


(Click here)
Buy this book at online book store in your country
Canada | UK | Germany | France

Book Summary Information

Author: Rachel Cusk
Edition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2003-03-01
ISBN: 0312311303
Number of pages: 228
Publisher: Picador
Product features:
  • ISBN13: 9780312311308
  • Condition: New
  • Notes: BRAND NEW FROM PUBLISHER! 100% Satisfaction Guarantee. Tracking provided on most orders. Buy with Confidence! Millions of books sold!
Accessories:

Book Reviews of A Life's Work: On Becoming a Mother

Book Review: loved it...
Summary: 5 Stars

It would be an understatement to say that I love this book. I have found in Cusk's voice a place that I can rest in. My son, now five, is amazing, but my own birth as a mother was frought with questions, uncertainty, loneliness. Oh how I wish I had found this book. As I read I am brought back to the early days of motherhood.

I cried when I read that once her daughter's colicky cries ended she realized her baby had gone through yet another birth. And what mattered was not how well Cusk performed her mothering duties - but that she had been there throughout her daughter's crying and pain. She realizes that this presence above all is ultimately what it means to be a mother.

Motherhood is so polticized - just look at the reviews here - and Cusk is a breath of fresh air in a landscape of literature the is overly sentimental and awash in banality. She perfectly portrays how judgemental we are about mothers. It's a damned if you do damned if you don't world. I love reading stories of moms who triumphed.

Of course the book is stream of consciousness - it perfectly mimics the experience of early motherhood when time itself is not linear any longer and you no longer know who you are.

I loved her forays into literature - it's as if her struggle to integrate these two aspects of herself is laid bare for all of us to see - and I would hope sympathisize with. Literature is her scripture that she uses to make meaning and to find her place in the world of mothers.

She said in the beginning to the book - that she was not going to write about her husband. So I was not surprised that she didn't mention him often.

This is a book for those who are thoughtful reflective and willing to be open and honest about this most amazing yet challenging experience of motherhood. It's not for the faint hearted, but neither is motherhood.

Summary of A Life's Work: On Becoming a Mother

The experience of motherhood is an experience in contradiction. It is commonplace and it is impossible to imagine. It is prosaic and it is mysterious. It is at once banal, bizarre, compelling, tedious, comic, and catastrophic. To become a mother is to become the chief actor in a drama of human existence to which no one turns up. It is the process by which an ordinary life is transformed unseen into a story of strange and powerful passions, of love and servitude, of confinement and compassion.

In a book that is touching, hilarious, provocative, and profoundly insightful, novelist Rachel Cusk attempts to tell something of an old story set in a new era of sexual equality. Cusk?s account of a year of modern motherhood becomes many stories: a farewell to freedom, sleep, and time; a lesson in humility and hard work; a journey to the roots of love; a meditation on madness and mortality; and most of all a sentimental education in babies, books, toddler groups, bad advice, crying, breastfeeding, and never being alone.

Parenting Books

Book Subjects
Most talked about in Parenting Books
The Yummy Mummy's Survival Guide ImageThe Yummy Mummy's Survival Guide
by LIZ FRASER
HARPERCOLLINS PUBLISHERS LTD; Published: 2006; Hardcover; Book
The Best Baby Name Book: Over 3,000 names and your new baby's star sign ImageThe Best Baby Name Book: Over 3,000 names and your new baby's star sign
by Louise Nicholson
Thorsons; Published: 2003-02-25; Paperback; Book
Best price: $4.50
Price in other shops: $9.95
Schoolyard Bully: How to Cope With Conflict and Raise an Assertive Child ImageSchoolyard Bully: How to Cope With Conflict and Raise an Assertive Child
by Kim Zarzour
Harpercollins Canada; Published: 1999-12; Paperback; Book
Best price: $125.62
Secrets of the Baby Whisperer For Toddlers ImageSecrets of the Baby Whisperer For Toddlers
by Tracy Hogg
Random House Audio; Published: 2002-01-29; Audio Cassette; Book
Best price: $6.24
Price in other shops: $25.00
Make Peace With Anyone: Breakthrough Strategies to Quickly End Any Conflict, Feud, or Estrangement ImageMake Peace With Anyone: Breakthrough Strategies to Quickly End Any Conflict, Feud, or Estrangement
by David J. Lieberman
St. Martin's Griffin; Published: 2003-01-02; Paperback; Book
Best price: $4.93
Price in other shops: $14.95
How to Raise an American: 1776 Fun and Easy Tools, Tips, and Activities to Help Your Child Love This Country ImageHow to Raise an American: 1776 Fun and Easy Tools, Tips, and Activities to Help Your Child Love This Country
by Myrna Blyth, Chriss Winston
Crown Forum; Published: 2007-03-20; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $4.61
Price in other shops: $22.95
Starbright--Meditations for Children ImageStarbright--Meditations for Children
by Maureen Garth
HarperOne; Published: 1991-10-25; Paperback; Book
Best price: $7.92
Price in other shops: $13.99
Raising Your Spirited Child Workbook ImageRaising Your Spirited Child Workbook
by Mary Sheedy Kurcinka
William Morrow Paperbacks; Published: 1998-03-04; Paperback; Book
Best price: $5.98
Price in other shops: $14.99
The Explosive Child: A New Approach for Understanding and Parenting Easily Frustrated, Chronically Inflexible Children ImageThe Explosive Child: A New Approach for Understanding and Parenting Easily Frustrated, Chronically Inflexible Children
by Ross W. Greene
Harper Paperbacks; Published: 2001-01-23; Paperback; Book
Best price: $7.49
Price in other shops: $14.00
The Dance of Anger: A Woman's Guide to Changing the Patterns of Intimate Relationships ImageThe Dance of Anger: A Woman's Guide to Changing the Patterns of Intimate Relationships
by Harriet Lerner
Harper Paperbacks; Published: 1997; Paperback; Book
Best price: $2.83
Price in other shops: $14.00
Similar Books and other products
The Lucky Ones ImageThe Lucky Ones
by Rachel Cusk
Harper Perennial; Published: 2005-10-04; Paperback; Book
Best price: $0.01
Price in other shops: $13.99
What's Going on in There? : How the Brain and Mind Develop in the First Five Years of Life ImageWhat's Going on in There? : How the Brain and Mind Develop in the First Five Years of Life
by Lise Eliot
Bantam; Published: 2000-10-03; Paperback; Book
Best price: $11.28
Price in other shops: $20.00
Momma Zen: Walking the Crooked Path of Motherhood ImageMomma Zen: Walking the Crooked Path of Motherhood
by Karen Maezen Miller
Trumpeter; Published: 2007-11-13; Paperback; Book
Best price: $8.89
Price in other shops: $15.95
Misconceptions: Truth, Lies, and the Unexpected on the Journey to Motherhood ImageMisconceptions: Truth, Lies, and the Unexpected on the Journey to Motherhood
by Naomi Wolf
Anchor; Published: 2003-02-04; Paperback; Book
Best price: $3.95
Price in other shops: $16.00
This Is Not The Story You Think It Is: A Season of Unlikely Happiness ImageThis Is Not The Story You Think It Is: A Season of Unlikely Happiness
by Laura Munson
Amy Einhorn Books/Putnam; Published: 2010-04-01; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $1.08
Price in other shops: $24.95
Waiting for Birdy: A Year of Frantic Tedium, Neurotic Angst, and the Wild Magic of Growing a Family ImageWaiting for Birdy: A Year of Frantic Tedium, Neurotic Angst, and the Wild Magic of Growing a Family
by Catherine Newman
Penguin (Non-Classics); Published: 2005-03-29; Paperback; Book
Best price: $2.80
Price in other shops: $15.00
The Bradshaw Variations: A Novel ImageThe Bradshaw Variations: A Novel
by Rachel Cusk
Farrar, Straus and Giroux; Published: 2010-03-30; Hardcover; Book
Best price: $1.00
Price in other shops: $25.00
Arlington Park: A Novel ImageArlington Park: A Novel
by Rachel Cusk
Picador; Published: 2007-12-26; Paperback; Book
Best price: $0.01
Price in other shops: $14.00
Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year ImageOperating Instructions: A Journal of My Son's First Year
by Anne Lamott
Random House; Anchor; Published: 2005-03-08; Paperback; Book
Best price: $6.98
Price in other shops: $15.00
The Country Life: A Novel ImageThe Country Life: A Novel
by Rachel Cusk
Picador; Published: 2000-01-01; Paperback; Book
Best price: $2.48
Price in other shops: $16.00
Book store. Illustrated catalog of books on different categories