Summary

In her introduction, Cusk reflects on how she arrived at motherhood unprepared. She states that this book is “an attempt to describe something of that arrival” (2). Her interest in writing about motherhood vanished a few months after her daughter Albertine was born, but she finally wrote the memoir after becoming pregnant with her second daughter, Jessye. She remarks that the realm of motherhood does not translate well to the world outside of it, as it is a private experience for which women exchange their public selves. Cusk considers the ways in which men and women are typically divided by parenthood in society, with mothers generally doing the majority of housework and childcare, and men remaining more attached to their work and careers. She specifies that her definitions of woman and of mother are vague, but that she has become aware of...