Enjoyed How Should A Person Be? and Motherhood -- Heti has a distinct voice and style that I enjoy and recommend to others.

This book is overwhelming unique. It doesn't feel like a novel at all, more like a book of essays on the decision of whether or not to have children. I wouldn't say I "liked it" necessarily, but I did think the writing was very interesting.

I loved Sheila Heti's previous book so I was excited to pick this one up. Motherhood has been a difficult transition for me, personally, and I appreciate more than ever the considerations of other women before they decide to make the leap, and I find childless or child-free narratives to be interesting. This book didn't really work for me, unfortunately, on that level, as it seemed like Heti hit a wall and wasn't able to go any deeper into her imagined future, all of the paths of possibility. at that point, the discussion became sort of circular and pedantic. I wish the overlay of mystical thinking had been stronger and more consistent. Overall, she's a great writer and it's an enjoyable-enough read, but it didn't really work for me on the level I hoped for.

This book was fascinating and interesting ..... but I am very sorry to say that I didn't get all the way through this book before my time to read it expired. A nuanced look at a complex topic.

As women, it's our one job to reproduce, but is it? Some women can't wait to be mothers, others want to wait for the right time. Some women can't have children, and some women don't want children. This book examines one woman's journey through one of the biggest decisions women make between the ages of 20-40(the childbearing years). To have a baby or not to have a baby, that is the question.

Thank you to Henry Holt and NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book.

I couldn't get this book. I read it from cover to cover and I just couldn't find the something that drew it all together. To me it seemed really repetitive and there was really no cohesiveness.

I wanted to read this book because from a young age, I didn't want kids. Everyone one in my family and all of my friends knew this about me. I love kids. I was the neighborhood babysitter, I was a Girl Scout Camp leader, I went to school to become a child psychologist, but I just didn't want to have any of my own. One year before my Doctor agreed to tie my tubes if I hadn't had kids I got pregnant, two years later came baby number 2 and 10.5 months after that baby number 3. So I was really looking forward to reading this book and hearing someone else's perspective on the topic.

I couldn't relate to anything in this fiction/non-fiction tale. I'm not even sure if the main character had a name. Was it the author? The boyfriend was Miles. I'm not sure what message was trying to be conveyed, but I didn't get it.

I don't know if I will read other books by this author.

This one gutted me, turned me inside out and upside down and then righted me again. It's a brutal read, so honest and vulnerable and there were so many times when I felt the author in my BRAIN. I have never read a book about the choice of becoming a mother that ran so close to my own thoughts, at the same time it was wildly different from my own experience; I bookmarked dozens of passages and returned to them over and over. I set it down for days at a time to process but always came back and I cried when it was over. A breathtaking read.

This book was absolutely amazing, and just in time for mother's day! It captured all the levels of what it means to be a mother, and it's a conversation that is rarely had. Is being a mother the best thing ever? Perhaps not but it is a job that takes care and skill. It actually reads more like a diary, and we get to hear the struggle of understanding what being a mother really means to the narrator. Would 100% recommend.

The issue of whether or not to have a child is the driving question of this autobiographical novel. The narrator, a woman in her late thirties, is plagued with doubt about something she sees so many women go through as a natural part of maturation. Naturally, most women do not suffer the internal struggle here as evidenced by the population explosion of modern times. It is as easy as falling off a log. But for some, it requires a thorough examination of the existential act of becoming a mother.

Looking at the question of whether to take on the role of mother, the narrator looks at all aspects of her life and that of her mother and grandmother. She has a loving partner, Miles, who already has a child so he is not anxious to reproduce for the sake of having a family. Miles seems perfectly happy with his new partner; childless seems okay. But the narrator digs deep into what it will mean for her, for them as a couple, and for the rest of her life, realizing that once a mother, it is a lifetime commitment. She considers every aspect of motherhood, even the part where one day she will make the child, or adult child, an orphan. This book is a thorough examination of life. It was difficult to read at times because I consider the question of having a child a serious one, perhaps at the same level as Heti. I finished reading this significant piece of writing wishing that more women would give the issue soul searching thought before they decided to procreate.

Thank you, NetGalley and Henry Holt for the opportunity to read this ARC.

Sheila Heti describes a dream in which she has a son. She says “I loved him, but I also felt like the love was not as I imagined it would be; it was not as deep to the core as I thought it would feel…” This expectation that motherhood will change a woman deep to the core, potentially destroying that core in the process, is a terrifying and disincenting possibility to the writer.

Its interesting to me that society expects us to experience life choices unambivalently, and in a way, Heti accepts that premise. In this stream of consciousness, she analyzes her own feelings, those of her friends, and those of society at large about mothers, motherhood, and women as “not mothers”. I found the section where she tosses coins to answer her own questions to be weirdly fascinating.

The topic of motherhood has been written about a thousand times. Should you have kids? Why don't you have kids? Don't you want kids? When to have kids? Sheila Heti has taken all of that and written a book that speak to me in ways that no other book on motherhood or being a woman ever has.

Sheila Heti writes almost diary like chapters of her life. She is in a long term relationship and approaching 40. Her friends are having kids, every person she runs into asks about having kids, etc etc. It's nothing that unfamiliar to me. This is very "How Should A Person Be?" - What is expected of us, what is wanted of us, what do we want for ourselves. Heti explores what become of a woman after motherhood.

Sheila Heti is one of my favorite contemporary writers and I loved this book. She's a star and I already can't wait for her next book.

Thanks to NetGalley, the publisher and Sheila Heti for the opportunity to read and review this book.

My first Sheila Heti book. Wow! Such innovative style and form. I wanted a bit more from the story - I occasionally found it circular and repetitive - but was intrigued by the narrator's desires and wanted to know where and how she'd end up. Would recommend to a friend - but not to my mom ;)

The book's concept is interesting and one that is currently being explored by many women I know. Unfortunately the lack of real plot made the book difficult to get through.

In 2018 women are still being told that motherhood as the true meaning and purpose of their lives. It's impossible to avoid, and anxiety producing. Heti grapples with these pressures and the toll they take on women's psyche. It's not a topic often discussed, but Heti faces it head-on.

I wanted to love this book so much but sadly I was unable to connect with the story.

I really wanted to like this book, but try as I might, I couldn’t make sense of it or get interested in it. The book is based around the main character, a woman in her 30’s, whose name I probably should know, but don’t and her boyfriend Miles. She is grappling with the idea of motherhood, if she will become a mother, as she is unsure that she wants to but also unsure if she should pass the opportunity by. Her musings on this and other issues feels plodding and hard to become concerned about. I just could not embrace this character. I also couldn’t read to the end of the book. However, everyone should decide for themselves, as you may love the book. So, don’t take my opinion - make your own, as I hate giving any book a bad review!

Oh dear. There’s wit here, and inexhaustible philosophical insight on the eponymous topic, but there’s no fictional engagement. For the reader, this cerebral dive into procreation offers little narrative distraction. Fine, if that’s what you seek. But me, I like a story.

I struggled even with tagging this book, because it felt like a memoir, not a novel. I felt like I was eavesdropping on Heti's inner life and it was simultaneously fascinating, boring, relateable, and foreign. She has some interesting questions about the value of womanhood and art and priorities and I cared about her opinions on the topic, but it felt almost clinical to me. I couldn't bring myself to care which choice Heti would make.

As someone who is utterly fascinated by the process of choosing to have children, specifically the idea that people realize there's a choice, I was extremely intrigued by the concept of this book. Unfortunately, the writing style is just too bizarre for me and I could not get into it at all.

Sheila Heti’s Motherhood is an introspective, philosophical work of art that addresses what it means to be a mother, to want or not want to be a mother, the societal expectations of womanhood, and the longstanding implications of our mothers and our grandmothers on our own life experiences. Heti writes as a 39-year old woman, her eggs (as some might say) on the verge of extinction. Is a woman’s life meaningless if she does not bear children? What if she doesn’t want to?

Motherhood is a feminist manifesto, timely and deep. Heti explores what womanhood means, writing across the boundaries of her life as a writer and a daughter. In her quest for her truth, she interrogates herself, married friends, those who happily or grudgingly have undergone childbirth, and her 80 year old friend who is happily single and childless.

Heti doesn’t provide answers, rather allows that each woman’s experience and expectations will be different. Heti draws us into her corner, to the desk where she writes, and confides in us her desire, her anxiety, and her dreams.

Thanks to the author, publisher, and Netgalley for the advance digital copy. All opinions are my own.

The writing style wasn't really my style so it was a little difficult to read, but a decent story overall.