The Nursery
Books | Fiction / Women
4
Szilvia Molnar
A debut novel from a remarkable new talent: a visceral and revelatory portrait of a woman struggling with maternal fear and its looming madness, showing how difficult and fragile those postpartum days can be, and how vital love is to pull anyone out from the darkThere is the before and the after. Withering in the maternal prison of her apartment, a new mother finds herself spiraling into a state of complete disaffection. As a translator, she is usually happy to spend her days as the invisible interpreter. But now home alone with her newborn, she is ill at ease with this state of perpetual giving, carrying, feeding. The instinct to keep her baby safe conflicts with the intrusive thoughts of causing the baby harm, and she struggles to reclaim her identity just as it seems to dissolve from underneath her.Feeling isolated from her supportive but ineffectual husband, she strikes up a tentative friendship with her ailing upstairs neighbour, Peter, who hushes the baby with his oxygen tank in tow. But they are both running out of time; something is soon to crack. Joyful early days of her pregnancy mingle with the anxious arrival of the baby, and culminate in a painful confrontation – mostly, between our narrator and herself. Striking and emotive, The Nursery documents the slow process of staggering back towards the simple pleasures of life and reentering the world after post-partum depression.
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More Details:
Author
Szilvia Molnar
Pages
208
Publisher
National Geographic Books
Published Date
2023-03-21
ISBN
0593316843 9780593316849
Community ReviewsSee all
"Really sad and I think it's important, but could also scare people. "
Skye Edelson-Bennett
"There are a lot of really great books about the difficulty and surreality of childbirth and motherhood, and this is one of them. HOWEVER, this book has also made me realize that no matter how hyped up a book or author is, I should probably skip these books going forward. I think all partners or support people (who have not given birth or who have only had easy births) to the birthing parent should read this. I think that this book is also helpful to those who feel validated reading that they aren’t alone. For me, though, it puts me right back into those days that I frequently had to compartmentalize and lie to myself to get through. REALLY great book, but for me really unenjoyable. "
C
CaitVD
