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A review by thereadhersrecap
The School for Good Mothers by Jessamine Chan
4.0
Frida Liu had a very bad day.
She left her eighteen-month-old daughter Harriette at home while she went to the local coffee shop for an iced coffee. What was meant to be a 10 minute trip to the coffee shop turned into a two-hour abandonment? Emergency removal of Harriette takes place and Frida is sent to a new reform program for bad mothers for an entire year.
“Now, repeat after me: I am a bad mother, but I am learning to be good”
Frida’s entire life gets scrutinized by the courts. What was it like growing up? What were you doing on the day of the incident? Why did you leave her at home? Do you let her watch television? An endless scrutinization. Frida falls into a ceaseless “I should have” shame spiral. It’s honestly something I’ve struggled with myself. Constantly questioning whether you’re doing the right thing for your child, always second-guessing yourself, always thinking you should have done something different.
The School takes on a prison-like feeling right from the start. She’s not allowed anything from home, she’s only allowed to wear the “school” uniform, guards are in rotation, weekly phone calls home (if she’s lucky), and constant video monitoring.
“She is a bad mother among other bad mothers. She neglected and abandoned her child. She has no history, no other identity”
One mother locked her 6 kids in a hole in the floor. Another was there because her daughter broke her arm sliding down a slide. Another whose daughter had bruises on her arms, another lost custody when she turned herself into the psych ward. The mothers gossip incessantly about each other. They obviously all made terrible mistakes, some worse than others, but it's questionable whether they deserve to be sent to what I feel is a prison for mothers.
The mothers go through a series of classes of psychological torture. It’s honestly disturbing. It’s like Squid Games meets some kind of dystopian robot movie. The mothers must prove their good mothering by completing each unit assessment perfectly. If they pass, they are allowed the privilege of a 10-minute video call with their family.
This book is very terrifying and downright disturbing but also eye-opening. It questions what it means to be a mother in today’s modern world. What determines a good mother from a bad mother? It criticizes the expectations society has on mothers as well as what mothers expect of each other and of themselves.
She left her eighteen-month-old daughter Harriette at home while she went to the local coffee shop for an iced coffee. What was meant to be a 10 minute trip to the coffee shop turned into a two-hour abandonment? Emergency removal of Harriette takes place and Frida is sent to a new reform program for bad mothers for an entire year.
“Now, repeat after me: I am a bad mother, but I am learning to be good”
Frida’s entire life gets scrutinized by the courts. What was it like growing up? What were you doing on the day of the incident? Why did you leave her at home? Do you let her watch television? An endless scrutinization. Frida falls into a ceaseless “I should have” shame spiral. It’s honestly something I’ve struggled with myself. Constantly questioning whether you’re doing the right thing for your child, always second-guessing yourself, always thinking you should have done something different.
The School takes on a prison-like feeling right from the start. She’s not allowed anything from home, she’s only allowed to wear the “school” uniform, guards are in rotation, weekly phone calls home (if she’s lucky), and constant video monitoring.
“She is a bad mother among other bad mothers. She neglected and abandoned her child. She has no history, no other identity”
One mother locked her 6 kids in a hole in the floor. Another was there because her daughter broke her arm sliding down a slide. Another whose daughter had bruises on her arms, another lost custody when she turned herself into the psych ward. The mothers gossip incessantly about each other. They obviously all made terrible mistakes, some worse than others, but it's questionable whether they deserve to be sent to what I feel is a prison for mothers.
The mothers go through a series of classes of psychological torture. It’s honestly disturbing. It’s like Squid Games meets some kind of dystopian robot movie. The mothers must prove their good mothering by completing each unit assessment perfectly. If they pass, they are allowed the privilege of a 10-minute video call with their family.
This book is very terrifying and downright disturbing but also eye-opening. It questions what it means to be a mother in today’s modern world. What determines a good mother from a bad mother? It criticizes the expectations society has on mothers as well as what mothers expect of each other and of themselves.