Mothers who Think. by Camille Peri and Kate Moses, eds. (New York: Villard Random House, 1999) xi +282 $34.50 Cdn. cloth. ISBN 0-375-50269-6

I am not sure what it was about this particular book that caught my attention from among the hundreds of books in the "Parenting" section of the bookstore I was browsing through. It's not one I would buy: hardcover, small and expensive. The title was seductive: could I be one? Imagine, thought and motherhood together in three words. The contributors were not all strangers to me, and those I had previously encountered, I had enjoyed meeting. Maybe it was the cover? Gray tones of leather boots, herringbone and saddle shoes. It is a picture ambiguous in time; contemporary in production, yet retro in vision. I was in the bookstore that day searching for books which would provide insight into motherhood and the work of mothering. Being a mother of two daughters, I felt too close to the condition to consider it calmly. I had assiduously avoided such books as I raised my children; I didn't need any more guilt. But whatever called me, I bought this book, and have since read it through. It will now begin a long journey passing among friends and family, who will, I hope, be as deeply moved as I was by the thoughts that mothers think.

Culled from a collection of essays published in the on-line magazine Salon, the authors share their thoughts on motherhood, mothers, and the work of mothering. In 272 pages, 37 essays cover a range of topics, illustrating with clear-eyed, poetic prose the complex moments, movements and memories of motherhood. The authors are all women, as are all mothers, and they are all daughters, as are all women and they write from experience. The collection is an odd mix of recollections and reflections which resonate here and there with memories of pregnancy, adolescence, my mother, me. The theme of motherwork is constructed under the direction of articulate, definitely liberal and politically aware, if not actively engaged, women and covers such topics as adoption, fathers, work, birth, sex, surrogacy and incest, arranged gently along the lifeline beginning with birth and continuing until death. I read this book over the course of a few days, while commuting, waiting for a bit of space and time, here and there in my busy life. Each essay caused me to shed a tear, sometimes a river in shared sympathy, in happiness and in sorrow; for love remembered and pain shared; and in sorry sadness of our culture in which incest, racism and poverty continue to complicate the lives of women and children. These are articulate, well-written, and thoughtful ruminations on motherhood by mothers who clearly think. Two words of advice: carry kleenex.

Margaret Shkimba