I had heard really good things about this debut novel by Jessamine Chan, but it sounded like one of those books that would make me really angry, so I avoided it for a while. Then I came across a signed copy in one of my local little free libraries and I couldn’t resist grabbing it. When my book club asked for nominations for the next quarter, I nominated this one as a way to force myself to read it.
That was all right before the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade and then I REALLY didn’t want to read this book, but I felt like I had to, even though I could have chosen to just not attend last month’s book club meeting.
I do think the book is very good, and I’m glad I read it. It made me more sad than angry, just because the main character, Frida, is put in such a hopeless position. Nothing she does is ever right, and it doesn’t matter how hard she tries or what she puts up with, none if it is ever good enough.
The book starts in the middle of the afternoon of what Frida calls her one very bad day. Her husband has left her for another woman and they are sharing custody of their one-and-a-half-year-old daughter, Harriet. Frida is struggling to juggle work and the baby, and the baby is not sleeping, which means Frida is not sleeping. At one point, Harriet’s crying gets on Frida’s last nerve and Frida decides she just needs to go out for a cup of coffee. Rather than hire a babysitter or ask a neighbor to watch Harriet, she plunks her down in a baby chair she’s a little too big for, but not so much that she’ll be able to move. Frida figures Harriet will be safe there for the time it takes her to get coffee, but getting coffee turns into running to the office to grab something she needs, which turns into answering emails, and two hours later she’s on her way home handling phone calls from Child Protective Services who were alerted to the fact that a baby was left alone and have confiscated said baby.
Frida meets up with her ex, Gust, and his girlfriend, Suzanna, at the police station. Frida is questioned, and it is determined Harriet is not safe with her, so Gust is temporarily granted full custody. Frida has to wait months before her trial, and in the mean time cameras are installed everywhere in her house so she can be kept under surveillance and she will only be allowed three half-hour supervised visits with Harriet. Three visits turns into two and each half hour manages to get cut short because the social worker has absolutely no empathy for Frida.
If you know anything about this book, you probably have an idea of where this is going. Frida is sentenced to one year at a new school designed to turn bad mothers into good mothers. The program includes a uniform, no hair cuts, no razors to shave with. Not only are there cameras everywhere, but the “training” involves giving the mothers robotic dolls with AI technology so they can learn from and react to their mothers. The mothers are “taught” by childless women in pink lab coats, who, like the social worker, have no empathy for the mothers or what they are going through. They believe (and teach) that a mother needs to be perfect at all times, is not allowed to ever make a mistake, and is not supposed to need anything other than their child. They are told repeatedly that a mother cannot be lonely because they have their child. Not that they should not be lonely, but that they are incapable of being lonely.
I think the impossible situation the mothers are placed in can be summed up in this line: In order for the mothers to pass a test, the teachers “should be able to see the doll’s humanity.”
They are given 10 minutes on Sunday to call their children, and they are given a script. They are only allowed to say certain things, express certain emotions (namely gratitude for other people caring for their children) and they’re only allowed to say “I love you” once. The 10 minutes are never extended to allow for technical or scheduling difficulties, and the calls are suspended for the slightest infraction.
The mantra the mothers had to repeat constantly was, “I am a narcissist. I am a bad mother, but I am learning to be good.”
As it turns out, there is a school for fathers, but it is much more lenient than the school for mothers. Sunday phone calls with the kids are an hour, and they are never revoked because it’s assumed it’s good for the children to see their fathers, but apparently it’s not good for them to see their mothers. WTF?
The mothers have to work with the fathers for certain activities to learn to work through certain situations that supposedly happen in the real world, although nothing about this horrific school has any bearing on the real world. Frida and another father develop feelings for each other. He keeps looking for excuses to touch her and tell her he loves her, and although Frida feels the same, she resists his advances because she knows she’s always being watched, but even her biology is being monitored. The fact that her body temperature rises and her heartrate increases when he’s around is enough to incriminate her, as though she’s supposed to not have any feelings at all. They expect the robotic doll to be human, but they expect the human mother to be robotic.
I won’t give away the ending, but I’m not sure how to talk about the ending without giving it away. I don’t think I felt satisfied by the ending, but I’m not sure how else it could have ended that would have been satisfying and in line with where the book was leading.