A life's work: on becoming a mother

A New York Times Book Review Notable Book, this memoir by multi-award-winning author Rachel Cusk explores the transformative experience of motherhood. Selected as one of the 50 Best Memoirs of the Past 50 Years by the New York Times, it delves into the contradictions of motherhood, portraying it as both commonplace and unimaginable, prosaic yet mysterious. Cusk reflects on the dualities of this role—banal yet bizarre, compelling yet tedious—capturing the essence of becoming a mother as a solitary performance in a drama of human existence. Her narrative reveals how an ordinary life morphs into a tale of profound passions, love, servitude, confinement, and compassion. With humor and insight, Cusk recounts a year of modern motherhood, weaving together stories of lost freedom, lessons in humility, and the roots of love. This memoir serves as a meditation on madness and mortality, offering a sentimental education in the realities of parenting—babies, books, toddler groups, and the challenges of never being alone. The New York Times Book Review praises it as "funny and smart," likening it to a war diary, describing it as wholly original and unabashedly true.