Beach Reads: Are You My Mother?

Summer is an especially nice season to whip out a good book: Whether you're at the beach, waiting for a flight or just trying to distract your mind from the miserable, miserable heat, there's no shortage of opportunities to get lost between the pages.

We asked Babbo's Books owner Leonora Stein to offer some suggestions for great summer reading. Her choice for this week is a graphic novel entitled Are You My Mother?

Title: Are You My Mother?

Author: Alison Bechdel

Genre: Graphic Novel

Stein says: Are You My Mother? is a follow-up to Bechdel's 2006 graphic novel Fun Home, a memoir about Bechdel's father, a long-closeted gay man who died in a traffic accident shortly after coming out.

Are You My Mother? turns the lens now to Bechdel's relationship with her mother, who, though alive, evidently provides no shortage of fodder for Bechdel's incisive prose. 

"It’s very very different [from Fun Home], and in a way, much more complex and a lot harder to understand," said Stein.

"It’s also very cerebral. For a graphic novel it’s not an easy read. It's beautifully drawn, and I think people who have similar issues with their mothers—mothers who are perhaps cold, or unfeeling or distant, would relate."

Despite Bechdel's weighty subject matter and penchant for lofty references—Virginia Woolf, Adrienne Rich, DW Winnicott and the like—the book is still accessible for those who care to try it out.

"It is a graphic novel, so you will read it relatively quickly," she said. "It’s just that you might have to read it again."

This book—as well as stacks of others—is available at Babbo's Books, located at 242 Prospect Park West.