NEW RELEASE
The Mothers' Group - Fiona Higgins (2012)
Six diverse women are drawn together through their post-natal group. Ginie is a no-nonsense lawyer who is hiring a nanny and heading straight back to work. Made is a young Balinese woman who has come to Australia with her older husband and has to raise her son without the support of her family and village. Miranda is finding it difficult dealing with her stepson, a disruptive toddler, and finds wine o'clock is creeping forward every day. Suzie's partner left her during her pregnancy but when she meets Bill, she's hoping she may not have to raise her daughter alone. Pippa's birthing experience has left her with lingering health problems but she's too embarrassed to share what's wrong. And Cara is the peacemaker of the group who runs into a former lover. This is an engrossing story which slowly reveals each character's multi-layered backgrounds, before leading to an incident that shatters them all.
The Mothers' Group, by Fiona Higgins, tells the story of six very different women who agree to meet regularly soon after the births of their babies. The summary says: "Set during the first crucial year of their babies' lives, The Mothers' Group tracks the women's individual journeys - and the group's collective one - as they navigate birth and motherhood as well as the shifting ground of their relationships with their partners. Each woman struggles in her own way to become the mother she wants to be, and finds herself becoming increasingly reliant on the friendship and support of the members of the mothers' group. Until one day an unthinkably shocking event changes everything, testing their bonds and revealing closely held secrets that threaten to shatter their lives." The Mothers' Group is out in April. Higgins is the author of Love in the Age of Drought and lives in Sydney.