Cutting Teeth: A Novel by Julia FierroMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
A Brooklyn playgroup plus their spouses and one nanny goes to Long Island for a short vacation together and drama ensues. Together the playgroup characters capture what it feels like to be a modern day parent in the urban United States: there is baby lust, difficult pregnancies, so much anxiety, a renegotiation in marriage, financial stresses, mom wars and jealousies, gender issues- both among parents and children- the whole deal. I don't think the author left anything out. I think that it very accurately captures the state of parenthood right now. This is not what it was like for previous generations, and (let's hope) not what it will be like for future generations.
My favorite part of the novel is the Tibetan nanny that grounds the whole story by being a reminder of the difference between things that matter and things that ultimately don't matter. Of course, in real life as in the novel, this reminder often doesn't stop us from experiencing the pain of our personal dramas.
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