by Ester Bloom
Making the choice to have children, as the novelist Elizabeth Stone once said, “is momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body.” In my case, my husband and I can spend a harrowing day feeding, bathing, changing, playing with, and cajoling to sleep our 18-month-old and then collapse on our bed in exhaustion—at which point we start jabbering about how amazing her sturdy little legs are. Parenting is a fierce, irrational, giddy kind of love that only makes sense when you are inside it.
At least these books can give you a very important taste of what you might be in for.
Far From the Tree, by Andrew Solomon
As a parent, you can never predict what your child may ask of you—or the surprising ways in which you may rise to the challenge. Solomon’s book deals with the myriad ways that special needs, marginalized, and other non-mainstream children test their families and how they, as well as their communities, respond. An intense but fascinating and worthwhile read.
(To read the full article, please visit the Barnes & Noble Book Blog.)
