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The Motherhood Affidavits: A Memoir

“Laura Jean Baker has written a beautiful and brave memoir of motherhood and its discontents, which are indistinguishable from its joys. This is a warmly intimate yet intellectually provocative personal document of originality and considerable charm.”

—Joyce Carol Oates

With the birth of her first child, soon-to-be professor Laura Jean Baker finds herself electrified by oxytocin, the “love hormone” — the first effective antidote to her lifelong depression. Over the next eight years, her “oxy” cravings, and her family, only grow — to the dismay of her husband, Ryan, a freelance public defender. As her reckless baby — making threatens her family’s middle — class existence, Baker identifies more and more with Ryan’s legal clients, often drug — addled fellow citizens of Oshkosh, Wisconsin. Is she any less desperate for her next fix?

Baker is in an impossible bind: The same drive that sustains her endangers her family; the cure is also the disease. She explores this all — too — human paradox by threading her story through those of her local counterparts who’ve run afoul of the law — like Rob McNally, the lovable junkie who keeps resurfacing in Ryan’s life. As Baker vividly reports on their alleged crimes — theft, kidnapping, opioid abuse, and even murder — she unerringly conjures tenderness for the accused, yet increasingly questions her own innocence.

Baker’s ruthless self — interrogation makes this her personal affidavit — her sworn statement, made for public record if not a court of law. With a wrenching ending that compels us to ask whether Baker has fallen from maternal grace, this is an extraordinary addition to the literature of motherhood.

  • Format
  • hardcover
  • Pages
  • 288
  • Language
  • english
  • ISBN
  • 9781615194391
  • Genres
  • memoir, parenting
  • Release date
  • 2018