Ally Bloom is on maternity leave from her job as a fashion PR. She hasn't quite settled into parenthood nor has her body bounced back yet. When her mother-in-law Judy moves in indefinitely, Ally decides to make the most of that catastrophe - by heading back into an environment she understands and can control - the offices of fashion label Moda. But her young, supposedly useless, replacement, Lola, has managed to usurp her. So Ally quits and becomes determined to nail it as a stay-at-home mum. And fitting in at her Happy Mummies playgroup is her first mission. But since she prefers Nicki Minaj to the Wiggles and fears she will also start coveting hiking sandals, it's not an easy transformation. This is a very funny debut about a woman trying to get comfortable with her new identity. You'll be nodding along as you recognise the different parenting types who make up any mothers' group.
Confessions of a Once Fashionable Mum, the debut novel by interiors journalist Georgia Madden, is about a glamorous career woman finding herself her way around the suburban mummy circuit. The summary says: "Successful hubby? Tick. Facebook-worthy baby? Tick. Bikini-body six weeks after giving birth? Um . . . not so much. Fashion PR exec Ally Bloom got her happy ending. Okay, her marriage might be showing the odd crack, her battleaxe mother-in-law might have come to stay, and she might not be the yummy mummy she'd imagined, but it's nothing a decent night's sleep and a firm commitment to a no-carb diet won't fix. But when Ally returns to work and finds she'll be reporting to a 22-year-old airhead, she decides to turn her back on life as a professional fashionista and embrace her inner earth mama instead. So it's out with the Louboutins and champagne and in with the sensible flats and coffee mornings with the Mummy Mafia. From attending her first grown-up dinner party only to discover that placenta is top of the menu to controlling her monster crush on local playgroup hottie Cameron, Ally must find her feet in the brave new world of the stay-at-home mum."