Page-turning books to share with your favourite mother
In honour of Mother’s Day, here are five page-turners that explore the unique mother-child bond, in all its heartwrenching joy and agony.
The Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane, Lisa See This riveting new novel follows Li-yan, a tea-picker from an ancient hill tribe in the remote Yunnan province of China.
When she breaks village tradition and becomes pregnant out of wedlock, she’s forced to give her daughter up for adoption. The following decades see big changes for both mother and daughter, who never lose hope of being reunited. My Name is Lucy Barton, Elizabeth Strout Pulitzer Prize-winning author Elizabeth Strout treats the often fragile mother-daughter bond with tenderness and care in this #1New York Times bestseller.
The book finds its titular character in a hospital room in the 1980s, suffering from a mysterious infection, kept company by her estranged mother. Confined to her bed, Lucy must face the past she fled. Secret Daughter, Shilpi Somaya Gowda The international bestseller centres on Asha, a baby girl born in rural India and adopted out of a Mumbai orphanage to a wealthy, infertile, mixed- race couple in San Francisco.
The book chronicles Asha’s life growing up, touching on the culture clash her American mother experiences, and the hardships her Indian mother faces in the slums. A home-run of a debut for Gowda, who was born and raised in Toronto. For You Mom, Finally, Ruth Reichl Nobody writes about food quite like former New York Times restaurant critic and Gourmet magazine editor Ruth Reichl. But Reichl is also a master at probing the complex mother-daughter bond and has frequently written about her life growing up with a mentally ill mother. In this book, she investigates her mother’s life, making peace with the past. Where We Belong, Emily Giffin For a lighter read, this chick-lit title centres on a 36-year-old Manhattan television producer who’s in love and living large. But when a teenage girl knocks on her door one night, it changes everything, unlocking memories she thought she had left behind forever.