The paperback edition of Polly Rosenwaike’s trenchant story collection is now out.
With Mothers’ Day around the corner, we’re preparing ourselves for the annual flood of mom-con, heartstring-pulling television specials, SNL sketches about “the day you were born” and memes about “mom juice.” We have a new cultural artifact to add to the maternal mix: Polly Rosenwaike’s knife-sharp story collection Look How Happy I’m Making You. As the low-key distress that characterizes the Alex Katz painting on the cover might suggest, this collection does not come sunny side up. Rosenwaike is interested in the subject of motherhood at its most raw, intimate and difficult. Her characters—some mothers, some wishing to become mothers—all grapple with very real struggles. The twelve stories are bursting with self-doubt, infertility, post-partum depression, avoidance, the shifts in dynamics when babies come on board (or fail to). It doesn’t  matter if you’re a mother or have no intention of becoming one. You’ll feel heard.

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