Show Me the Way: A Memoir in Stories

For best selling author Jennifer Lauck, confronting the unfinished business of childhood is the most important step toward motherhood. Her earlier books, Blackbird and Still Waters detailed breathtaking losses, including the early death of her parents, her brother's suicide, sexual abuse, and unsuccessful attempts to reach her birth mother. In this memoir of short stories, Lauck reveals a gallant and inspiring process of creating meaning in her painful legacy. Lauck's vivid scenes from memory and motherhood evoke psychologist Selma Fraiberg's idea of the "ghosts in the nursery." Scenarios range from subtle to disturbing to slapstick with her sense of humor always intact. She describes how nipple shields saved the day and the diamond studded, power-suited woman in Starbuck's who watched in horror as Lauck reached for a vomit stained wallet while her children spilled a sea of chocolate milk on the table. She writes, "My juggling act is over. I am the poster of the anti-mother who makes the case for contraception." Lauck is a gifted, engaging writer who leads readers to the busy intersection where parenting and personal history meet. While the details of Lauck's story are strikingly unique, every mother will identify with her unvarnished view of motherhood and with the self-discovery that awaits each parent. --Barbara Mackoff