Mothercare

Local Description

Review: 'A true force in American literature.' - George Saunders; 'A new thought in every sentence.' - Lydia Davis; 'Lynne Tillman has always been a hero of mine.' - Jonathan Safran Foer

Author Biography: Lynne Tillman writes novels, short stories, essays, and criticism. Her novel No Lease on Life was a finalist for a National Book Critics Circle Award in Fiction, and her essay collection What Would Lynne Tillman Do? a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award in Criticism. She is a recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship and a Creative Capital/Warhol Foundation Grant for Arts Writing, and in 2022 she won the Katherine Anne Porter Prize. She is a Professor/Writer-in-Residence in the English Department at the University of Albany. She lives in Manhattan with the bass player David Hofstra.

Description

From the brilliantly original novelist and cultural critic Lynne Tillman comes Mothercare, an honest and beautifully written account of a sudden, drastically changed relationship to one's mother, and of the time and labor spent navigating the healthcare system When a mother's unusual health condition, normal pressure hydrocephalus, renders her entirely dependent on you, your sisters, caregivers, and companions, the unthinkable becomes daily life. In Mothercare, Tillman describes doing what seems impossible: handling her mother as if she were a child and coping with a longtime ambivalence toward her. In Tillman's celebrated style and as a 'rich noticer of strange things' (Colm Toibin), she describes, without flinching, the unexpected, heartbreaking, and anxious eleven years of caring for a sick parent. Mothercare is both a cautionary tale and sympathetic guidance for anyone who suddenly becomes a caregiver. This story may be helpful, informative, consoling, or upsetting, but it never fails to underscore how impossible it is to get the job done completely right.