Customer Reviews

A Better Woman : A Memoir of Motherhood

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Susan Johnson shares her childbirth experiences and the unexpected complications she endured afterwards. This book is also the stoy of a single writer adjusting to being a married woman with two babies and an illness, who is still a writer-- but a different person. "A Better Woman," as the title says. In the first pages of the Forward, Johnson talks about how she went from feeling in control of her body to the horror of needing a colostomy. I read this and thought, I'll skip the really graphic medical stuff and wondered if I really wanted to continue reading.

I continued and I was glad I did. Johnson's voice is self-reflective, acknowledging the memoirist's dilemma of always selecting what to write and what to leave out. She's opinionated and detailed. Although she questions her openness, I found her writing candid and heartbreaking. Johnson is changed by motherhood and her medical ordeals. Reading this book felt like a friend sharing the details of her day to day life. Her writing is elegant and spare. At times she stops her narrative and addresses the reader directly:

"Perhaps by now, all these years later, you might have even found that book of my personal way washed up on some remainder table or library shelf. Inside its pages you may be able to detect tears, the scent of milk, a baby's howling. You may feel the flame of my life race up your fingers and know a little of what it feels like to feel burned.

"For in its pages my actual waking life smolders still, giving off the kind of smoke which always lingers in the wake of an incendiary blaze.

"Reader can you smell it? Can you?"

Reading Susan Johnson's lyrically written account of the unexpected maternal wave that swept over her in the middle of her autonomous writer's life, I was brought straight back to the shock and power of my own early motherhood. Although I never suffered the physical disabilities Johnson describes, I understood perfectly the dual nature of love and drowning that Johnson experiences. There are so many hidden aspects of womanhood - so many unofficial stories. That mix of passion and powerlessness, that learning to relinquish control and the mourning of it, are universal experiences that are not often addressed and should be. If you want to read a very beautifullly written account of a real woman's experience of motherhood written by a powerful writer, this is the book.

At the age of 35, Susan Johnson realizes that she desperately wants to be a mother. At 38 she is pregnant with her first child, moving back her to homeland of Australia, and getting ready to "settle." Although deliriously happy with her new baby and new life, she realizes that something isn't quite right and is soon diagnosed with a recto-vaginal fistula, something that is practically unheard of in the Western world (although prevalent in developing countries). This memoir is Susan's story--about life as a new, first-time, older mother. Settling down with a man who isn't really the settling down type. Attempting to remain a surviving writer. And dealing with a rare medical condition that can be painful, not to mention embarrassing and humiliating.

I really did not enjoy the book at first. It wasn't until about halfway through that I really started to not only get into the book, but really even cared about her story. She doesn't really talk about the fistula until the midway point, and I guess I was just waiting for that. It's probably also important to mention that I am not really a fan of "literary memoirs" (as my sister says: it's probably really great. I did not think the first half was great). I prefer the more gritty, real writing to the pretentious, flowery writing that she has. Looking back, I can see that the first half of the book was probably fine; it just didn't really have anything to do with the reason I picked up the book in the first place. One thing I loved, though; is that Johnson has some wonderful phrases that are immensely quotable. Example: "Having children exposes you. I will know who you are when I see how you wish your children to live." And "Isn't it a form of arrogance to assume that misfortune will not personally visit you, or to allow yourself to believe the man who says his love for you is endless as space?" I really liked that she got into a bit of feminist theory and quoted/discussed Germaine Greer. I also thought she had a wonderful observation on the recent prominence of what she describes as the "earth-mother hierarchy"--where the focus on getting back to natural childbirth, home births and midwives forgets that "birth involves danger." Overall, I enjoyed the book a lot. And when I forget about the first half, I love it.

This author had a tough time with motherhood, especially post partum, there is NO doubt about that. I myself had some issues with my tearing and would have been horrified if I had read this book first. But, just reading this for inspiriation alone, I found myself very bored by it. I guess I just didn't like her writing style. She drones on and on and on. I found Anne Lamont's Operating Instructions a much more engaging memoir about motherhood.

It is interesting to read Susan write about the two pregnancies she had and the resultant complication. It is also amazing to see how she entwines her life experiences in writing and draws something back into her life, a power which she gains from the understanding,knowledge of life through the writing.

At one end if you get to know things like controlled crying technique for bablies, happy vomiters - Just as I wonder why the 'morning sickness' was never mentioned - she had to deal with many other serious problems in life like managing her career, finances.

In a very simple style, she brings home many realisations in family realtions.