Between Mothers and Sons: Women Writers Talk About Having Sons and Raising Men

(Paperback)

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"The challenge for mothers of sons is to realize that because we do not share a sexual identity, that because we have not grown up in a male body, we cannot presume to understand everything there is to know about our sons' worlds." -- Patricia Stevens Between Mothers and Sons is the first anthology in which women writers attempt to answer the question that all mothers have contemplated in the course of mothering the opposite sex: "Who is this male child who came out of my body" Or, as a pregnant Mary Gordon said when her doctor told her she was having a boy, "Oh, my God. What am I supposed to do with one of them" From the earliest days of nursing to the good-byes of college and looming adulthood, these writers collectively explore, in a thrilling range of styles and sensibilities, the delights and frustrations, the deep and often conflicted emotions, they feel in their roles as mothers to their male children. Between Mothers and Sons resoundingly and unflinchingly celebrates this journey we are all making with our boys. with essays from: Julene Bair Janet Burroway Robb Forman Dew Deborah Galyan Mary Gordon Joy Harjo Anne Lamott Susan Lester Jo-Ann Mapson Leigh McKinley Valerie Monroe Naomi Shihab Nye Eileen Pollack Jewell Parker Rhodes Patricia Stevens Sallie Tilsdale Kris Vervaecke Patricia Williams

Reviews

The New Yorker The difficulties of raising girls have been examined so thoroughly in recent books...that it was beginning to look as though boys were getting short shrift. Between Mothers and Sons...helps to tip the scales back. Norah Vincent The Washington Post Book World Crafted from a deeply female and loving perspective, these essays will move and possibly heal reluctant feminist mothers and sons.

Author Bio

Patricia Stevens has written essays that appear in Minding the Body: Women Writers on Body and Soul as well as in The Healing Circle: Authors Writing of Recovery. She has received the James Michener Fellowship and the Nelson Algren Short Story Award. She is the mother of two sons and lives in Portland, Oregon.