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  • Motherhood

  • A Novel
  • Written by: Sheila Heti
  • Narrated by: Sheila Heti
  • Length: 5 hrs and 16 mins
  • 4.0 out of 5 stars (64 ratings)

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Motherhood cover art

Motherhood

Written by: Sheila Heti
Narrated by: Sheila Heti
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Publisher's Summary

From the author of How Should a Person Be? (“one of the most talked-about books of the year” - Time Magazine) and the New York Times best seller Women in Clothes comes a daring audiobook about whether to have children.

In Motherhood, Sheila Heti asks what is gained and what is lost when a woman becomes a mother, treating the most consequential decision of early adulthood with the candor, originality, and humor that have won Heti international acclaim and made How Should a Person Be? required reading for a generation.

In her late 30s, when her friends are asking when they will become mothers, the narrator of Heti’s intimate and urgent audiobook considers whether she will do so at all. In a narrative spanning several years, casting among the influence of her peers, partner, and her duties to her forebearers, she struggles to make a wise and moral choice. After seeking guidance from philosophy, her body, mysticism, and chance, she discovers her answer much closer to home.

Motherhood is a courageous, keenly felt, and starkly original audiobook that will surely spark lively conversations about womanhood, parenthood, and about how - and for whom - to live.

©2018 Sheila Heti (P)2018 Macmillan Audio

Hear the Author Read an Excerpt

At Between the Pages: An Evening with the Scotiabank Giller Prize in Toronto on November 4, 2018, author Sheila Heti read an excerpt from her novel Motherhood.
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What listeners say about Motherhood

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

The best Sheila Heti book so far

The tone and the rhythm and the peaceful meandering and the open ended questioning all feels so perfect in this book. I love the book and the ending was perfect too.

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2 people found this helpful

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    3 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars
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    2 out of 5 stars

Too long didn’t breed

Some passages were real thinkerers, but didn’t finish the book because her voice (literal and figurative) grated on me. #Audible1

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1 person found this helpful

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    5 out of 5 stars
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Super helpful

This was actually an amazing book that really balanced perspectives and felt like a genuine human experience of the struggle in finding your inner voice on motherhood and learning to hear it.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

We Don't Know Random

Tossing a coin might seem like perfectly random chance, but a fair coin paying one person on heads and another on tails produces totals which while passing each other and reversing frequently in the beginning, after billions of tosses has one player always ahead an arbitrarily large amount and the reversals becoming nonevents. Thus there is truth behind the terms winners and losers even in a fair toss game.
Sheila has used a fair toss to drive her life. She tells her story in her own pleasant voice with her intonation adding a depth of understanding. Far from a dithering random dance, what emerges is a thoughtfully interwoven tapestry, which ultimately gives her truth and peace.
This is an example we can all learn from. By accepting and tailoring it to your own needs, it may take you somewhere wonderful that you didn't expect.

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  • Overall
    1 out of 5 stars
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    1 out of 5 stars

Boring

This was not what I expected. More like an old woman kept whining about problems that only exist in her mind

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1 person found this helpful

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    1 out of 5 stars
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Depressing

I couldn’t get past the first few chapters. Found the main character wishy washy. Was maybe hoping for something inspirational or at least interesting but the questions she asked along the way made her seem like such a weak and narrow minded character that I was completely turned off. I very rarely dislike a book enough not to finish it. I should have trusted my judgement on this one as I didn’t really like the sample, but a friend had told me it had rave reviews so I went for it. Not for me!

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Not for me

Wasn't what I was expecting at all, I listen to a lot of audiobooks but this one was a no for me. Might be better in written form?

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