Mother Extraordinaire


Book Description

On a hazy summer morning in 1961, amidst a visit from her best friend Brenda and Brenda’s infant daughter, Kelly’s world shatters in a single moment. A mundane trip to the grocery store to replenish milk turns into a nightmare as Kelly returns to find devastation in place of her cozy apartment complex—her cherished friend and her own daughter Donna Jo lost to the merciless flames. Left with only Brenda's baby, a mirror image of her lost child, Kelly makes a life-altering choice in the blink of an eye and claims the child as her own. A decade later, the past resurfaces when Brenda's widowed husband Paul reaches out, igniting a storm of conflicting emotions within Kelly. Despite the deep bonds forged with her “adopted” daughter, the guilt and haunting shadows of the past refuse to release their grip. And then there's the enigmatic presence of an old homeless woman, a witness to Kelly's actions, who threatens to reveal her deepest darkest secret. This story is a saga of love, family, forgiveness, and redemption against a backdrop of tangled emotions and unforeseen dangers. As Kelly navigates the intricate web of her choices, the narrative twists and turns, revealing the enduring power of love to conquer even the darkest corners of the human heart.




You Sexy Mother


Book Description

Mothers.




Who's Your Mama?


Book Description

Unlike other motherhood books that focus on the experiences of a small group of affluent, married white women, Who's Your Mama? centers on the largely untold perspectives of the majority of American women, whose unique and sometimes unconventional family structures impact our country. Their contributions speak practically of their personal beliefs, intimate relationships, and socioeconomic realities. The book explores the intersection between motherhood and other facets of the contributors’ lives, including race, class, sexuality, politics, and personal tragedy. Personal stories include a feminist juggling the roles of activist and mother, a college graduate who applies for welfare so she can remain home with her child, a gay couple’s navigation of the adoption process, and a mother’s celebration of her own vibrant sexuality. This collection of personal narratives will illuminate various female experiences of parenting and humanize a variety of social and economic issues that affect millions of American women and their families.




Media Depictions of Brides, Wives, and Mothers


Book Description

Media Depictions of Brides, Wives, and Mothers, edited by Alena Amato Ruggerio, explores how television, film, the internet, and other media variously perpetuate gender stereotypes. The contributors to this volume bring a variety of feminist rhetorical and media criticism approaches from across the communication discipline to their analyses of how television, film, news coverage, and the Internet shape our expectations of the performance of women’s identities. This collection includes studies of Bridezillas, Jon & Kate Plus 8, Sex and the City, Sarah Palin, Nancy Pelosi, The Devil Wears Prada, Practical Magic, “momtini” blogs, and Mad Men fan websites. Readers will learn to apply the insights from each chapter to their own sets of myths, stereotypes, and assumptions about gendered roles, and to recognize the possibilities for both liberation and domination when women’s practices of marrying, mating, and mothering are represented and misrepresented in the media. This collection is an essential contribution to media studies and criticism of gender stereotypes in contemporary culture.




Bad Mother's Revenge


Book Description

'Hello, you have reached the Bad Mothers Crisis Helpline. Your call is important to you. Your call may be monitored for Staff Entertainment purposes. Please choose an option from our options menu, or hold the line until one of our overpaid, single and childless staff members can be bothered to take your call.'It's not easy being a mother. In Bad Mother's Revenge Sonia Neale explains how most parenting books are really Weapons of Mass Deception, how the Dalai Lama would be a whole lot more impressive if he had to remain serene with three children in tow, and answers the eternal question, how many happy teenagers does it take to change a light bulb? (Answer: there's no such thing as a happy teenager.)A witty, original and frequently poignant look at motherhood, that isn't afraid to look at the dark side, as well as the joys, of being a mum.




The Official Soccer Mom Devotional


Book Description

"Soccer moms" are those spending enormous amounts of time transporting school-aged children (and their friends) to various events--sporting, academic, musical and social--on top of all of the other things they do. Where does this leave time for connecting with God? For those who are part of this sisterhood of moms on the go, help is at hand--and you will still get to these events on time! With The Official Soccer Mom's Devotional, no matter where a mom finds herself, whether it be waiting for the kids to get out of school or finish an athletic or extracurricular practice, she will have a resource right at her fingertips that will provide a mini devotional time with God. Help moms feel rejuvenated in their souls with inspiration, checklists, appropriate Scripture that applies to a "soccer mom's" day, fun stuff, a Mom's Space page, and practical soccer mom tips and quizzes.




From Village Boy to Global Citizen (Volume 1): The Life Journey of a Journalist


Book Description

From Village Boy to Global Citizen (Volume 1): The Journey of a Journalist is the first of an autobiographical trilogy that tells the story of a rustic lad born and raised in the southern tip of the British colony of Ceylon (now independent Sri Lanka) but left his country at the age of 26 on a geographical “conquest” of the world that turned him metaphorically into a global citizen. Starting his professional career as a journalist for the Daily News, Ceylon’s premier English-language daily, he became a journalism teacher at the age of 32, when he received a doctorate in mass communication. However, he continued practicing journalism as a free-lancer throughout his teaching career in Malaysia, Australia and the United States. Volume 1 unfolds the transition of the author’s life from a village kid to a global journalist and educator. It dramatizes the obstacles he had to overcome, as well as the support he received from his benefactors, in the transition.




Maternal Representations in Twenty-First Century Broadway Musicals


Book Description

Maternal Representations in Twenty-First Century Broadway Musicals: Stage Mothers analyzes Broadway productions within the context of their presentation and assessment of motherhood and the variety of roles for mother figures. Using a frame of feminist and psychoanalytical positions, Gina MacKenzie establishes, defines, and interprets mother figures in contemporary Broadway, according to original categorizations of the absent, inconsequential, and overbearing mothers. MacKenzie considers how and why commercial representation of mother figures are limited and predominantly negative, even as fiction, poetry, and other forms of drama offer a much wider and progressive view of the varieties of motherhood possible in society, asserting the need for greater representation of mother figures in commercial musical theatre today.







Who’s Laughing Now?


Book Description

From dour old women to buzzkills who can't take a joke, the stereotype of the humourless feminist has repeatedly been deployed to derail and delegitimize the women's rights movement. This collection skips the tired debates that ask whether feminists can be funny—we know the answer to this already—to instead investigate contemporary expressions and functions of humour within international feminist movements and communities. This interdisciplinary volume showcases critical analyses of cultural texts and events, personal accounts of producing and encountering feminist humour, and creative interruptions that pair laughter with insight. As a whole, this work seeks to sideline caricatures of the humourless feminist by promoting a vision of a diverse movement vibrant with innovative, generous, threatening, and, ultimately, triumphant laughter.