Customer Reviews

Norma Jean the Termite Queen

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I read this novel years ago and was amazed anyone could write that well. Ms. Ballantyne's book is hilarious, heartbreaking, and renewing. I'm glad it's back in print again, because I lost or gave away my paperback copy years ago. I had almost memorized it at that point, but I need to renew my acquaintance of Norma.

Norma predates Anne Lamott's nonfiction journal "Operating Instructions" (diary of her son's first year), by decades, but in fiction you can be incredibly honest and outrageous and say the things society doesn't want to hear - such as taking care of kids can be a pain in the ass. That when you have kids, you give up a large part of yourself and your life (and it's usually the woman). In this year, 2000, I don't know if women are any better off than Norma was. I'd like to think so...............but I doubt it.

But as with Norma, you don't stop hoping, you don't stop working towards it.

This is a soul-affirming work.

This achingly honest portrayal of the lot of women and mothers will particularly resonate with those of us who remember the 50's and 60's, but anyone literate enough to read it should find its humor and anguish impossible to resist. I'm reading it for the third time, and it's as fresh, funny, and captivating as it was the first time I read it over ten years ago. Norma Jean is a 30-something, suburban wife and mother of three, struggling to define a life that is her own after 7 years of drowning in the demands of children and babies. Interspersed with Norma Jean's daily trials in the kitchen and carpool, are her dreams, snippets from books on motherhood and Egyptian mythology, and her conversations with the shrink. Ballantyne's skillful storytelling gives us a novel that is both hilarious and profound. If you want to smell the poop and feel the snot, if the idea of a pre-schooler with an imaginary friend named Fokey Fuckerhead makes you laugh, if you want Norma Jean's hilarious and devastatingly accurate commentary on everything from doctors to door-to-door salesmen, take the time to find a copy of this book to read and to keep. You won't regret it.

I bought this book in 1975 when it came out and still have that copy. My five children are now grown but were all ages at the time. I was the typical stay at home in the kitchen every afternoon Mom. It was so easy for me to relate to her humor and one of the things that stuck all those years was how much she hated Sunday because no one was in charge of the world. I always felt the same especially when all the children were needy and my husband at the time was little if any help. My escape was walking and the only thing I felt that kept me sane. As soon as the older three were capable of supervising the younger two I would head out for a long walk. My ex husband was rarely around on Sunday and since this was the toughest day the walk would if be a long one if the older kids were available. To me this was my mental housecleaning time. This many years later it is still every bit as funny and I find myself laughing out loud. I have sent it to several grown daughters with children finding the book on Amazon.
Donna Cook Novato, Ca

I really wasn't sure what to expect when I first picked up this book. It looked interesting enough. I started reading it and by the fourtieth or fiftieth page I was hooked. I love anything that debunks the fifties illusion. I've always known their was more to the myth then "I'm completley happy living for you and our kids. I need nothing else." Norma Jean, despite the fact that it had no relation to my immediate dilemas or problems made me stop and think. It was a guidepost for me. The title charater's caustic wit and her attitude towards the mundaness of life made me realize there's a little bit of a 1950's housewife in all of us.
I recommend reading this book if your in the midst of a life decision or if you need words of wisdom from someone other than your mother. The only real fault to this book is after reading it you may swear off having kids for the rest of your life.