Cutting Teeth
Books | Fiction / Thrillers / Domestic
3.5
Chandler Baker
THE NATIONAL BESTSELLER“Jaw-dropping ... A darkly comic send-up of motherhood.” —People“With devourable writing and pitch-perfect humor, Cutting Teeth is a sharp, original, wickedly astute look at the sting of modern motherhood.” —Ashley Audrain, New York Times bestselling author of The PushNew York Times bestselling author Chandler Baker's Cutting Teeth is a witty, thrilling story of parental love that asks: is there anything a mother won’t do for her children?Darby, Mary Beth, and Rhea are on personal quests to reclaim aspects of their identities subsumed by motherhood—their careers, their sex lives, their bodies. But their children disrupt their plans when an unsettling medical condition begins to go around the Little Academy preschool: the kids are craving blood.Then a young teacher is found dead, and the only potential witnesses are ten adorable four-year-olds.Soon it becomes clear that the children are not just witnesses, but also suspects . . . and so are their mothers.As the police begin to look more closely, the children’s ability to bleed their parents dry becomes deadly serious. Part murder mystery, part motherhood manifesto, Cutting Teeth explores the standards society holds mothers to—along with the ones to which we hold ourselves—and the things no one tells you about becoming a parent.
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Author
Chandler Baker
Pages
352
Publisher
Flatiron Books
Published Date
2023-07-18
ISBN
1250839793 9781250839794
Community ReviewsSee all
"<strong>So much more than a book about blood sucking children</strong>
I couldn't pass this book up. The idea of a classroom of preschoolers suddenly thirsting for blood drew in this actual preschool teacher.
This story has many pieces.
1- a class of 4-year-old students who are suddenly biting, at school and at home. The children begin demonstrating a thirst for blood.
2- A murder mystery where the culprit might actually be one of the children.
3- A tight-knit group of Mom friends
4- Three very different mothers, their approach to motherhood, and the inadequacies they feel they must cover up.
Cutting Teeth is a book about motherhood and the sacrifices that a mother makes.
I enjoyed the book and would recommend it. I did find the three mothers to be stereotypical- the overachieving room-mom, the granola mom who is also a single-mom running a business out of her home, and the mom who is barely holding onto her remote job as she navigates parenthood. The dad's were also stereotypical, working long hours or sitting on the couch watching TV. I think the stereotypes were a means of giving each mother-reader someone to identify with even if the reader is an amalgam of all three and more."
"So this book wasn’t exactly a page turner however I really have to recommend it to Moms!!! The premise is how Moms will do anything for their children. It’s also about mothers bonds with other mothers and trying to be the best. Throughout reading it, I thought I’d never do that…..but would I;)"
"Surpisingly, it wasnt my needle phobia that caused me to give up on this book..
The characters (specifically the husbands) irritated me to the point I couldn't enjoy the story. Which sucks, because Bloodthirsty toddlers & their desperate mothers trying to hold everything together, in theory, is a really cool premise. I think it's a neat way to explore the sacrifices & horrors that come with motherhood. I hate that I couldn't get over it enough to see if the story paid off. Probably didn't help that i was listening to the audiobook and having to hear the narrator whine like a baby every single time one of the kids spoke. Got halfway through before I couldn't stomach it anymore.
I may consider trying again in the future (with a physical copy), but would have to hear that the ending was worth revisiting this nightmare of a cast.
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"Definitely a little slow in the beginning for a murder mystery, but picked up in the middle to the point that it was a page turner!
I felt that it was *slightly* predictable, but there was a major twist at the end that I didn’t see coming! I love a shocking ending that leaves my jaw on the floor.
Super mind twisting and weird, but I also love how it taps deeply into both the raw joy and pain of motherhood. 100% worth the read
"
M P
Meghan Pattison
"I kept reading it because I thought the characters were SUPPOSED to be super unlikeable, generic, and just awful...then I kind of got the feeling I was wrong. A bunch of Karens, (with what I assume white women consider) unique names, let their kids drink their blood. I felt like I was reading the plot to a Lifetime horror movie. Do they make those ? Ugh"