Summer Reading, In Case Anyone Is Interested

I am currently trying to figure out what I'm going to write next, so I'm doing a lot of reading, mostly about motherhood and the different ways people write about it. Also I'm reading satire because that might be something I want to do. Maybe. I don't know. In any event, I'm open to suggestions.


This weekend I finished The Mommy Myth: The Idealization of Motherhood and How it Undermines All Women. As a result I now either want to start organizing women to lobby Congress for government-sponsored daycare, or I want to write a business plan for an affordable national daycare chain that also does your laundry and grocery shopping. Either way, this book has changed my life in some significant way that has yet to be revealed. It's a little dogmatic at times, but definitely a must-read for mothers. One of the authors has a terrific article up on In These Times about why women don't like Hillary Clinton. So, I pretty much want to be Susan J. Douglas, is what it boils down to.


I also finished The Brambles a few weeks ago. It was, um, okay I guess. It's hard for me to tell with fiction. The characters were well-drawn, but not much happens, and I felt like there was a lot left unsaid about motherhood and, like, why the characters did what they did.


And I read some chick-lit and in case anyone wants to write some, here's the formula: woman who hates her life makes a new friend, changes her life for the better (usually involving miraculously getting a new job), and also finds a guy. Or gets pregnant and has a baby. Either ending works.


Right now I'm making my way through David Lodge's Small World, which is funny primarily if you're married to someone getting a degree in literature, but also a good lesson on how to write terrific satire. I've only just started the book, but already there's a character named Miss Maiden who specializes in phallic imagery in literature. Somehow that doesn't seem as funny when I write it out, but trust me, it's funny. Expecially if you've ever had a conversation a literature professor.

Next up, based on assorted recommendations: Little Children, Thirteen Ways of Looking at the Novel, I Don't Know How She Does It (re-reading it), Life's Work, and Rattled. Any suggestions? Please let me know.