The Abandoners: Of Mothers and Monsters
‘The best kind of book: the one you didn’t know you were craving until it appeared … self-interrogative, intricately perceptive. I absolutely inhaled it’ JIA TOLENTINO
‘A very richly interesting exploration of a complex subject. Begoña Gómez Urzaiz tells the stories with such intelligence and wit and generosity’ TESSA HADLEY
‘Fascinating … I suspect there are many, many other mothers who are going to inhale The Abandoners’OBSERVER
When it comes to children: a man leaves, a woman abandons
Ingrid Bergman, Muriel Spark, Maria Montessori, Joni Mitchell … what did they give up to become the women they were to the world?
During the pandemic, trapped at home with young children and struggling to find creative space to write, journalist Begoña Gómez Urzaiz became fixated on artistic women who were able to overcome both society’s judgement and their own maternal instincts in order to leave their children. More than anything, she was fascinated by her own prejudice towards these women, so clearly tied up in a much wider cultural bias.
Using famous examples including Doris Lessing, fictional ones such as Anna Karenina, and interrogating modern trends like Momfluencers, Begoña reveals what our judgement of these women tells us about our judgement of all women.
‘The best book I’ve read on the implications of motherhood and its opposites after Sheila Heti’s Motherhood’ CLAUDIA DURASTANTI
”'Fascinating … I suspect there are many, many other mothers who are going to inhale The Abandoners. I know I did … So beautifully translated from Spanish by Lizzie Davis that you forget it’s translation, this is rich, vivid writing about the eternal push and pull of motherhood … Few things I have read lately convey so exactly the sense of loving your children so much you can barely breathe, yet sometimes craving escape” - GABY HINSLIFF, OBSERVER
'Compelling' Guardian -
'The stories are fascinating … intriguing … Truly moving' The Times -
”'Insightful … The book’s job isn’t to convince readers to forgive these women but to offer, with immersive storytelling, a look into the complicated nature of motherhood, the desire to break free from precarious relationships, and the paradoxes of modern feminism” - OPRAH DAILY
”'The best kind of book: the one you didn’t know you were craving until it appeared … self-interrogative, intricately perceptive. I absolutely inhaled it” - JIA TOLENTINO, author of TRICK MIRROR
”'A very richly interesting exploration of a complex subject. Begoña Gómez Urzaiz tells the stories of all these different women with such intelligence and wit and generosity” - TESSA HADLEY, author of THE PAST
'Perceptive…daring' LITERARY REVIEW -
”'The best book I've read on the implications of motherhood and its opposites after Sheila Heti's Motherhood” - CLAUDIA DURASTANTI, author of STRANGERS I KNOW
'Anyone who has ever judged a mother or been judged for being one will benefit from reading this book. Mothers are so much more than the boxes we put them in. This generous and rigorous work seamlessly connects real and fictional women, while offering an expansive view of a sensitive topic' MICHELE FILGATE, author of WHAT MY MOTHER AND I DON'T TALK ABOUT -
'An essential read' ZEBA TALKHANI, author of MY PAST IS A FOREIGN COUNTRY -