Celebrating Mothers and Daughters
This week Team Bookends are bringing you some uplifting reads to brighten your week – we know this is a difficult time and we want to help you celebrate those vital mother-daughter relationships nonetheless. Dive in to some of the reads below, or better yet, gift a copy to your mum and read-along together!
THINGS I’D TELL MY CHILD by Katie Piper and Diane Piper
Whether you’re becoming a mum for the first time or you have children who are growing up faster than you could have ever imagined, motherhood can feel like the most joyful and yet the most daunting of times. But you’re not alone.
From the moment I knew my first baby was a girl I started to plan, hope and dream. I couldn’t wait to experience that special bond, but I wondered how I’d feel about being a working mum, how I’d hold on to the person I am. I also knew that the world has changed so much since I was growing up. What advice, values and role models would help give my daughter the confidence and strength to cope with all that might come her way – and to give her an open mind and warm heart?
This is my journey in motherhood: my experiences, hopes and fears – with my mum’s stories of raising me, a parenting expert’s advice and empowering exercises – to guide you from those first wobbly moments to being a happy, healthy mum and raising children who aren’t afraid to be themselves – and to go for the life they want.
KATIE PIPER
HER MOTHER’S SECRET by Rosanna Ley
‘A beautifully written story of loss and love, Her Mother’s Secret is Rosanna Ley at her best’
My Weekly
Escape to the heart of enchanting Brittany with the bestselling author of The Villa and The Little Theatre by the Sea. The perfect treat for fans of Santa Montefiore and Veronica Henry.
For many years Colette has avoided returning to her homeland – the magical island of Belle-Île-en-Mer in Southern Brittany – afraid to confront the painful memories she left behind. She is living on the Cornish coast when she hears about her mother Thea’s failing health and realises that the time has come for her to go home. But can Colette ever forgive Thea for what she has done?
THE LOST CHILD by Emily Gunnis
Rebecca Waterhouse is just thirteen when she witnesses her mother’s death at the hand of her father in Seaview Cottage.
But what else did Rebecca see?
Years later, Rebecca’s daughters Iris and Jessie know their mother will never speak of that terrible night. But when Jessie goes missing, with her gravely ill newborn, Iris realises the past may hold the key to her sister’s disappearance.
With Jessie in trouble, Iris must unravel a twisting story of love and betrayal in her mother’s family history.
Only then will Seaview Cottage give up its dark and tragic secret…
THE PAPER BRACELET by Rachael English
For almost fifty years, Katie Carroll has kept a box tucked away inside her wardrobe. It dates from her time working as a nurse in a west of Ireland home for unwed mothers in the 1970s. The box contains a notebook holding the details of the babies and young women she met there. It also holds many of the babies’ identity bracelets.
Following the death of her husband, Katie makes a decision. The information she possesses could help reunite adopted people with their birth mothers, and she decides to post a message on an internet forum. Soon the replies are rolling in, and Katie finds herself returning many of the bracelets to their original owners. She encounters success and failure, heartbreak and joy. But is she prepared for old secrets to be uncovered in her own life?
HARVESTING THE HEART by Jodi Picoult
Number One bestselling author Jodi Picoult explores the demands of having a family on a new mother in this gripping bestseller.
Paige has only a few vivid memories of her mother, who abandoned her when she was five. Now, having left home for art school and marriage to an ambitious young doctor, she finds herself with a child of her own.
But Paige cannot forget her mother’s absence or the shameful memories from her own past, and running away is in her blood. Emotionally exhausted, overwhelmed by the demands of her family, she knows that this time, if she runs, she must leave behind her newborn child – but could it be possible Paige’s baby would be better off without her?
Exploring motherhood, absence and the legacy it leaves, this is an unputdownable story from bestselling Jodi Picoult.
TILL THE COWS COME HOME by Sara Cox
A funny and heart-warming love letter to childhood, family and growing up.
Till the Cows Come Home is DJ and TV presenter Sara Cox’s wonderfully written, funny coming of age memoir of growing up in 1980s Lancashire.
The youngest of five siblings, Sara grew up on her father’s cattle farm surrounded by dogs, cows, horses, fields and lots of ‘cack’. The lanky kid sister – half girl, half forehead – a nuisance to the older kids, the farm was her very own dangerous adventure playground, ‘a Bolton version of Narnia’.
Her writing conjures up a time of wagon rides and haymaking and agricultural shows, alongside chain smoking pensioners, cabaret nights at the Conservative club and benign parenting. Sara’s love of family, of the animals and the people around them shines through on every page. Unforgettable characters are lovingly and expertly drawn bringing to life a time and place.
Sara later divided her childhood days between the beloved farm and the pub she lived above with her mother, these early experiences of freedom and adventure came to be the perfect training ground for later life.
This funny, big-hearted and often moving telling of Sara Cox’s semi rural upbringing is not what you’d expect from the original ladette, and one of radio’s most enduring and well loved presenters.
