“I rejoiced in this collection. A radical, unflinching cycle of stories that radiate with truth and depth and care. I could weep for how good it is to see such rich, profound narratives about women’s reproductive lives. Happy tears.”
Elisa Albert, author of After Birth
“The world wants one story: pregnant glow, new mother tired but ever-grateful, ever-in-love. Without shying away from any of the transcendent and true beauty, Look How Happy I’m Making You shows us the many shadowed layers of pregnancy, miscarriage, birth and motherhood with an insistent bravery and searing honesty.”
Ramona Ausubel, author of Awayland and Sons and Daughters of Ease and Plenty
“These stories turn an empathetic and humorous eye on the time in women’s lives when the question of motherhood—whether gained or lost or desired at all—is central. Rosenwaike fearlessly plumbs the depths of women’s interior lives, illuminating their complexity, gravity, and lightness.”
Danielle Lazarin, author of Back Talk
“These stories, so artful and so visceral, help remind us that human reproduction is, despite its ubiquity, astonishing and fraught. Polly Rosenwaike explores pregnancy and parenthood with wisdom, wit, and tender intensity.”
Chris Bachelder, author of The Throwback Special and Abbott Awaits
“Each story in Look How Happy I'm Making You is a lovely universe unto itself—funny, intimate, casually profound—but there is something transcendent about reading them together like this. Rosenwaike’s women all have different desires, different fates, different circumstances, but each of them conquers the maddening unknown of motherhood with richness and depth.”
Meaghan O’Connell, author of And Now We Have Everything
“Whatever choices Rosenwaike's characters make, they struggle and question and find joy, and through their stories we come to understand parenthood and its influence all the more deeply. Her debut is funny, honest, and written with grace and empathy.”
Edan Lepucki, author of Woman No. 17 and California
“In this lovely collection, Rosenwaike deftly traverses the season of life that is often collapsed into the shorthand ‘childbearing years.’ These nuanced and entertaining stories honor the pain, joy, and possibility that accompany women's reproductive lives. I felt bereft when I came to the end.”
Lydia Kiesling, author of The Golden State
“A beautifully written and beautifully conceived series of stories about, well, conception . . . Among the thousands of books for prospective and new parents, I doubt any will make you feel more understood and less alone than this one.”
Anthony Doerr, author of All the Light We Cannot See
Featured in:
Amazon’s “Best Literature and Fiction of 2019 So Far”
People Magazine, “Book of the Week”
New York Magazine’s “The Approval Matrix” (“Highbrow Brilliant”)
O Magazine, “Ten Fantastic New Books to Read in March”
Glamour, “The Best Books of 2019 (So Far)”
New York Post, “The Best Books of the Week”
Vulture, “7 New Books You Should Read This March”
The Millions, “Most Anticipated” Books of 2019
Vulture, “37 Books We Can’t Wait to Read in 2019”
Bustle, “33 March Books to Add to Your Spring Reading List”
Hello Giggles, “The Best New Books to Read This Week”
BuzzFeed, “37 Amazing New Books to Add to Your Spring Reading List”
ABOUT LOOK HOW HAPPY I’M MAKING YOU
A candid, ultimately buoyant debut story collection about the realities of the “baby years,” whether you’re having one or not.
The women in Polly Rosenwaike’s Look How Happy I’m Making You want to be mothers, or aren’t sure they want to be mothers, or—having recently given birth—are overwhelmed by what they’ve wrought. Sharp and unsettling, wry and moving in its portrayal of love, friendship, and family, this collection expands the conversation about some of women’s most intimate experiences.
PUBLISHED BY DOUBLEDAY
& AVAILABLE HERE: