This is Your Mother by Erika J. Simpson
Thank you Goodreads and Scribner for the ARC of This is Your Mother.
When I travel I love to look through my ‘to read’ bookshelf and see if I have anything from/about the place I am visiting. I got lucky with this arc, it had been sitting on my shelf for a while and was set in Decatur - a suburb of Atlanta, Georgia. It made sense that since we had bought the concert tickets but not secured accommodations in Atlanta, that I would find an airbnb in Decatur, and pair the trip with reading this book. As I probably could have known if I had read any of the book before departing, Decatur is not exactly salubrious. It’s ok and our airbnb was on a pleasant enough street, but it had definitely seen better days and the smell of damp from the house lingered for a while. Luckily it was a short trip - both because of the damp and because the book is pretty short.
It might be short - but beautifully crafted. I love a short story or a short book - it’s like poetry but with more meat. I was surprised to find out this was a first novel since it is extremely well written, both witty and poignant.
I read ‘Crying in H Mart’ fairly recently, and this shares some DNA with that popular memoir. The themes of deep love but imperfect mother-daughter relationships are strong in both books. In my opinion Simpson does a much better job and manages to explore her grief while still being pretty darn funny in places. I loved the world according to Sallie sections, Sallie just jumped off the page.