MOTHERHOOD

(Harvill Secker £14.99) WHEN Canadian author Sheila Heti made her UK debut in 2013 with How Should A Person Be?, critics couldn’t agree on whether its playfully artless account of an indecisive writer named Sheila was ingenious, indulgent, or both.

Her new book — set to be even more divisive — is a diary-like ramble from a writer (this time unnamed) unable to decide whether to try for a baby with her boyfriend as she turns 37.

As she wonders about the symbolism of her dreams and attempts to solve imponderable dilemmas by tossing coins, the narrator’s fear of missing out jostles with the hunch that motherhood is simply a patriarchal ploy to foil female accomplishment.

Given how patronising she is regarding friends with kids, it feels evasive when her ideas of what it means to be ‘free’ are left unexamined by her blizzard of self-scrutiny.

However, think character study, not manifesto, and you’re more likely to appreciate the virtues of this indefinably slippery meditation, which is infuriating and insightful in equal measure.