I Have Everything I Had Twenty Years Ago, Except Now It's All Lower (Hardcover)

by Suzanne Ledbetter (Author)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review
Wife and mother Ledbetter has suddenly found herself a woman of a certain age with the attendant body, but still has children young enough to need supervision at the pool: a peculiarly '90s dilemma. In the tradition of the late Erma Bombeck, she leads us down the not-so-primrose paths of marriage, motherhood and endless housework.

From Publishers Weekly
Ledbetter, a contributing editor to Family Circle magazine, reports on domestic life from the vantage point of a 40-something mother of four, as she did in her earlier collection, The Toast Always Lands Jelly-side Down. Most of the 30-plus articles deal with Ledbetter's misadventures as a working parent, including the tribulations of carpooling, Christmas shopping, dealing with household gadgets, male inefficiency and packing for trips. Although there are occasional funny highlights, such as Ledbetter's "You know it's gonna be a bad day when..." list, some of the author's humor is labored and out of date. By the end of this collection, Ledbetter's persona as a bemused career woman struggling gamely to cope against the odds has worn very thin. Illustrations not seen by PW. Author tour.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 152 pages
• Publisher: Crown; 1st edition (April 11, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0517599791
• ISBN-13: 978-0517599792
• Product Dimensions: 8.8 x 6 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.5 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (1 customer review)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #3,120,824 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Bombeck with a twang, May 3, 2000

By	Nancy Parry McCluer (Nixa, MO USA) - See all my reviews

I'm sure that Suzann Ledbetter is probably used to being compared with Erma Bombeck by now (except for the obvious difference--that Suzann is still living). Let's see, there's "Erma for the 90s" and "Bombeck with a twang."

But as much as I liked reading Erma, she was the voice of my mother's generation. Her newspaper columns were clipped and mailed back and forth between my mom and her friends.

Suzann, however, is the voice of my generation, coming to me at a time (post-childbirth, pre-menopause) that I can appreciate the humor in such essays as "Good Mothers Do" and "Birthday Boondoggles." I can envision myself sending these gems to my contemporaries, but more likely through e-mail, than "snail mail."

But she wisely doesn't limit herself to writing about motherhood. She manages to skewer the rest of the world, and the goofy people in it, as well. Suzann, who lives just outside of Springfield, Missouri, is a contributing editor to Family Circle magazine and writes a Sunday column for the Springfield News-Leader.