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If you like the new TV show Bad Mothers, you might also like these scary mothers in literature, writes Kiran Dass
ELEANOR MELROSE
The Patrick Melrose Novels , by Edward St Aubyn
Warning! This brutal suite of five semi-autobiographical novels is so utterly moreish you won’t be able to get enough of the savagely despicable characters. With wonderfully droll titles Never Mind, Bad News, Some Hope, Mother’s Milk and At Last, these novels are a caustic take-down of the messed-up entitled English upper classes and chart Patrick Melrose’s decadent and highly dysfunctional life as he grows up and deals with toxic parents and his own subsequent alcoholism and heroin abuse. His selfish, disinterested and pill-popping mother Eleanor unforgivably turns a blind eye at the ongoing abuse Patrick suffers at the hands of his father David, leading Patrick on a devastating trail of self-destruction. It is Eleanor’s inheritance that has been keeping the family afloat, and she blows all of Patrick’s portion of it by giving it away to a hokey charity.
JOAN CRAWFORD
Mommie Dearest ,
by Christina Crawford Actress Joan Crawford was once a glamorous and successful Hollywood star. The Academy Award-winning Crawford made an indelible impact on the silver screen with her commanding roles in Mildred Pierce and the unforgettable psychological thriller Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? But the facade of her perfect, glossy life was shattered when in 1978 her adopted daughter Christina published a damning memoir, Mommie Dearest, a tell-all expose´ that shed light on Christina’s traumatic life of abuse under the unwavering control of her violent, erratic, alcoholic mother. Whether you read the book or watch the iconic film adaptation starring a convincingly menacing Faye Dunaway, it’s likely the phrase “no wire hangers, ever” will haunt you forever.
EVA KHATCHADOURIAN
We Need To Talk About Kevin, by Lionel Shriver
Shattering and harrowing, this unflinching novel delves into an uncomfortable scenario where mother Eva does not take to her son Kevin, who ends up going on a cold-blooded shooting spree, killing seven of his classmates, a cafeteria worker and a teacher at high school. Written as a series of confessional letters to her husband, Eva admits that she was ambivalent towards Kevin from reluctant conception and throughout his childhood and adolescence (at one point, she breaks his arm when she hurls him across a room). Fearing that her own ambivalence has contributed to Kevin’s anti-social behaviour, Eva wonders how much of her cold and indifferent attitude towards Kevin is to blame for his actions.
MRS LISBON
The Virgin Suicides , by Jeffrey Eugenides There’s a woozy, hazy atmosphere in this beguiling novel set in suburban Detroit. It follows five young sensitive sisters who, during one year, each commit suicide. Despite being unsocialised, the dreamy, eccentric and beautiful girls are longingly observed by all of the neighbourhood boys but their parents — in particular their overprotective mother, Mrs Lisbon — are steadfast Catholics who eventually take the girls out of school, forcing them into locked isolation in their dysfunctional family home. With her “queenly iciness” she truly believes her smothering actions are borne out of love. But it’s her unwavering strictness that ultimately causes her the biggest loss.