I don't know WHY she does it! (I Don't Know How She Does It - Allison Pearson)

Name: lewismich

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Product:	I Don't Know How She Does It - Allison Pearson
Date:	18.06.03 (94 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Readable, light fiction, Up-to-date

Disadvantages: Weighted too much in favour of the main character

My mother recommended this book to me, and being an avid reader in search of some lighter reading I thought I would enjoy it. I am a semi-fan of chic-lit. I enjoyed "Bookends" by Jane Green but hated most of her other stuff. "Rachel's Holiday" is excellent, "Lucy Sullivan is Getting Married" is not. I thought "I don't know how she does it" would appeal to me as a mother who works PART-TIME, but this was strictly the story of a mother who is juggling a more-than-full-time job with everything else coming way down on her list, including her kids.

The synopsis is as follows: Kate Reddy works as a fund manager in a City firm where the message of equality clearly has not filtered through to most of the people working there. As a mother, this means that she is constantly berrated for not being able to stay 100% on top of the job on the odd occasion that her family needs her. As a consequence, her home life slowly comes apart at the seams. Her kids are clingy when she finally has time for them, her cleaner never cleans, and she feels manipulated by the nanny even though she clearly needs her more than anyone else. She never has time for her friends and as for her husband....it's not exactly surprising when he finally walks out. As her life collapses around her, Kate decides to reasses and even gives "proper"mother hood a go, but in the end, she's still the same old Kate and it's not a long-standing solution...

If this were a diatribe against the problem of chauvinism in the City, it would perhaps strike a chord. Instead, we are supposed to feel sorry for the protagonist as everything mounts against her in her attempys to be a fuul-time worker and a mother too. Quite frankly, it doesn't wash. The author is very negative in her attitude towards full-time mothers and dismisses the possibility of working part-time out of hand. I can't feel sorry for Kate (except possibly the episode
with the rat - you'll see when you read it). However her long-suffering husband sounds like the perfect man! He is a great character and the nanny pulls through too when she's most needed.

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