This Is My Daughter
A Novel
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3.0 • 2 Ratings
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- $13.99
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- $13.99
Publisher Description
A New York Times Notable Book: A luminous, deeply affecting story of divorce, remarriage, and parenthood.
Peter and Emma, two single parents who have found love again after failed first marriages, dream of a peaceful and happy blended family with each of their daughters under one roof. They navigate this treacherous territory with the best of intentions, but face resistance from the girls, who, like many children of divorce, find their relationships tinged by grief, anger, and resentment. Emma's three-year-old daughter, Tess, takes to the arrangement while Amanda, Peter's sullen and unhappy seven-year-old, views it as a disaster rather than a fresh start. Over the course of this emotional powerhouse of a novel, Amanda becomes increasingly hostile and alienated—until one night she commits an act that threatens the already fragile bonds of the fledgling family.
Set on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, This Is My Daughter is a skillful and sensitive portrayal of the challenges facing modern families from master of the contemporary novel Roxana Robinson, whose acute observations of domestic life invite comparison to John Cheever and Henry James.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
The terrain of upper-middle-class WASP families and the country of divorce are explored with perceptive candor in Robinson's powerful and affecting novel. Emma Goodwin and Peter Chatfield move in the socially elite circles of Manhattan's Upper East Side. When they marry after having divorced their first spouses, each brings a daughter to the new union. Three-year-old Tessa, Emma's child, is adorable and secure, but seven-year-old Amanda, Peter's already difficult daughter, proves sullen, and rebellious. Although she can't admit it to herself, Emma favors and nurtures her own daughter, while Peter, not recognizing Amanda's fear and misery, is annoyed by her continuing defiance. Through insidious undercurrents of resentment and periodic confrontations, Amanda's self-confidence is eventually destroyed. Robinson is particularly adept at conveying the nuances of children's thoughts and behavior, and she sees clearly that they are the real victims of divorce, though readers feel equal sympathy for all players in the drama. Robinson renders the girls' bickering, Amanda's scornful negativity, and the guilt and recrimination that erode the Chatfields' marriage with emotional authority. These scenes occur against the convincingly textured background of private clubs and summer homes, the snobbish pride in blood over money and, sometimes, the cultivation of stingy economy over unseemly display. The last third of the book is hypnotic and achingly real, all too imaginable for parents who will recognize that unconscious acts have their tragic consequences. The author of two collections of short stories, the novel Summer Light and a biography of Georgia O'Keeffe, Robinson writes lucid and graceful prose that shines with compassion and wisdom about human frailty.
