The Bad Mothers of 2024
If you’ve been reading for a while, you know that Bad Mothers refers to women who refuse to conform. It doesn’t do any good, anyway, to conform. There’s nothing a woman can do that someone somewhere doesn’t feel permitted to judge or criticize. Here are some of my favorite examples from the year of women who put themselves first, put themselves last, and powered through.
The Bad Mothers of 2024 are…
Nightbitch, book and movie. I loved this book, and the movie even more. I don’t mean to fault the book in any way — but the book is full of such visceral scenes, a movie really does serve it incredibly well. I’d love to see even more lively versions of Nightbitch, like a play where we can be in the room when she goes full animal.
It’s the story of a mom who is struggling to reconcile love for her son with her love of basically anything else. She’s pretty much on her own with her toddler, but misses her life as an artist. She has things to say, and she hadn’t intended to be entirely sidelined as a human in order to become a mother.
I especially loved the sections alluding to Nightbitch’s mother, who died at some point before the start of the story. I’m endlessly fascinated by the mysteries and sacrifices our mothers carry with them. I’ve been recommending this film to everyone, but definitely read the book, too.
Donna Berzatto, on The Bear. Oh how I love Donna. I know The Bear had poor reviews for its third season, and I did really need to slog through the first few episodes (my take on Donna in seasons 1-2 here). But aside from the kitchen drama, this show is so much about the impact we allow other people to have on our emotional well-being. The most fascinating relationship to me is the one we feel the weight of the most, but witness the least: Donna and her children. Donna is an alcoholic and probably mentally ill, and she sows chaos for her entire family. In season three, she appears in just one episode, when her daughter Natalie goes into labor.
The thing that is so wonderful about Donna, is that in spite of her many flaws, she does seem to try. There’s no sense that she is holding a grudge against Natalie for putting distance between them; she listens. The love, generosity and patience mother and daughter each show each other in this scene is so moving to me. It sounds crazy, but I’m jealous of Natalie; her mother really wants to do the work, and she is working hard.
Catherine Ravenscroft, on Disclaimer. This is one show that deserved every poor review. It felt entirely overdone and unnecessarily dramatic. But I’m not here to tell you about horrible TV shows you shouldn’t bother watching; I’m here to tell you that Disclaimer showed how easily a woman can be mis-characterized as a truly bad mother. She wasn’t very close to her son as he was growing up, and now as a twenty-something he’s extremely resentful. The implication is that she has put her career before her relationship with him. Then, when a self-published novel suggests she had a brief affair many years ago, her family and co-workers all turn on her. It’s truly remarkable that everyone believes she did this horrible thing, and swiftly judges her.
The reason she is judged so quickly is that she is a mother who slept with a younger man while her husband was away. She is mother who built a successful career at the expense of her relationship to her son. Of course, all is not as it appears to be, but the central point is this: how dare a woman put her own desires before everyone else’s?
Gifty’s mother, in Transcendent Kingdom. (This novel came out four years ago, but I read it this year.) This is a beautiful novel about a young scientist trying to make a life for herself while caring for her mother. When Gifty’s mother suffers another depressive spell, Gifty moves her into her apartment. Her mother spends day and night in bed, drawing up painful memories for Gifty of the last time this happened, and of all of the tragedies her family has suffered. Yaa Gyasi’s writing is truly beautiful and explores that evolving dynamic of mother-daughter relationships.
Gifty’s mother was flawed — she was not affectionate, and following so much grief, Gifty was forced to become the classic parentified child — but we learn through Gifty that life has been unforgiving for her. This is not a driving plot, but an exploration. Gifty says, after falling into one memory from childhood, “And so I recognized, for perhaps the first time, that my mother wasn’t mine.”
Lia, in Fledging. In this unique novel, Lia lays an egg, it hatches, and she takes care of the baby bird that emerges. Throughout the novel, she’s wrestling with whether she wants to have children. The baby bird, which is a constant distraction from her work, and which she feels guilty for leaving each time she leaves the house, helps her see some of the responsibility of a baby, but almost none of the benefits.
The novel considers the old “biological clock” and the discordance of being a woman who does not hear the tick, tick, tick: “I’m bombarded with fertility adverts. Presumably it’s because of my age. The social-media algorithm knows that any woman over thirty yearns in the depths of her soul for biological children and wants to explore every possible way to have them...[The pictures] never show the pressure of always Wanting the Best for Them. Of the assumption that Their Needs Come First. You can’t take a picture of that.”
ICYMI
I’m excited (and a little overwhelmed!) to share the Bad Mothers podcast, which will kick off in earnest in January. I already have a few interviews complete with some courageous women willing to speak about their difficult relationships with their mothers, and how becoming mothers themselves has altered their perspective. You can find it on Substack, as well as Apple Podcasts and Spotify.
Introducing the Bad Mothers podcast
On the Bad Mothers podcast, we’ll dive deep into our maternal urges, or lack thereof. We’ll talk about the mothers we left, or who left us, and whether they haunt our own choices about having children.
Fancy an upgrade or gift subscription?
I’m offering a special rate for new annual subscribers who sign up before the end of the year. If you enjoy Bad Mothers, I hope you’ll consider upgrading to a paid or annual subscription, or gifting one. It’s just me running the show here — now figuring out how to license music and edit audio! — so your support is appreciated more than you know.
Top books for the year
This isn’t a book review newsletter, but if you’re interested, I shared the best books I read this year over on Instagram. See if you can spot a theme…
I’ll be off next week for Christmas, and back in 2025. Thank you for being here.
Oh, Disclaimer. I tried to explain to my h why I didn't like it. Seeing Cate's character so brutally nay GLEEFULLY, SELF-RIGHTEOUSLY dumped by her husband, colleagues, son....on no evidence, just a story knit of such tissue-thin lies it is blown apart by the merest breath of truth.
The mother of the rapist was a legit bad mother, by the way - she had evidence her son was a rapist and career abuser of women, but she covered it up, happily sacrificing another young mother on the altar of her wish fulfillment for her own rotten son.
Cate's character gets ONE good line, at the end, when she confronts her weak wanker of a husband, pointing out that his relief that she was raped and not merely unfaithful was even more unforgivable than the way he, who had said "you inspire me every day", treated her like used bubblegum when he was believing the fiction of the book.
What disgusted me about this movie was how it is not telling us anything new or showing a way forward. Women who dare to aspire for themselves, who dare to succeed, are guilty, even after proven innocent. It's not news, it's just an ongoing fact of women's lives, so making entertainment out of the harsh reality is just not entertaining, I guess.