Food and Whine: Confessions of a New Millennium Mom

by Jennifer Moses

Book Overview

Hailed by many as Erma Bombeck's heir apparent, Jennifer Moses -- journalist, essayist, prizewinning short story writer, and mother of three -- brilliantly transforms the mundane into the hilarious in her no-holds-barred record of a year in the life -- and the kitchen -- of a modern-day mom. Writing about the year in which her twins were born, her mother was diagnosed with cancer, and her husband decided to change careers, Moses regales readers with...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0684865629
• ISBN13: 9780684865621
• Release Date: May 2000
• Publisher: Touchstone Books
• Length: 224 Pages
• Weight: 0.64 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.5" x 8.8"

Customer Reviews

funny and touching

I read Food and Whine in two sittings, and would have done so in one, except I had to go to work. This book is so funny that I actually got a stomach ache laughing. But it's not, as the flap copy contends, some kind of updated Erma Bombeck. It's more like a memoir than like a series of stand-up takes on various mommy-related subjects. Also, the author grapples seriously with serious things, like her mother's cancer. In general, I found it to be a incredibly honest and refreshingly real account of motherhood -- and unlike most other books on this subject that I've read over the years, there's nothing gloppy or sentimental or trite about it. It's the author's disarming honesty, and ability to laugh at herself, that makes this book such a joy to read.

Refreshingly honest, touching and funny

This was a wonderful book -- a warm, touching and funny account of a very difficult year in a family's life. Moses tells her story with unrelenting honesty, from her competitive feelings toward her Harvard-law-school grad siblings, to her guilty self-centered thoughts during her mother's struggle with cancer. I look forward to her next book!

hilarious and poignant

Jennifer Moses' book is full of her insightful observations of life's contradictions...laughter, joy, sorrow, triumphs and tribulations. Written in a prose which induced honest to goodness belly laughs from this particular reader,she tells it like it is with humor and love. Insightful, hilarious, and poignant...a joy to read.

A wacky mixture of hilarity and humanity

This book is hilarious and a real page-turner. I read it in one sitting, give or take a few food breaks--which is part of the author's point: that the texture of daily life involves a whole lot of mind-numbing, repetitive food preparation when you are dedicated to nurturing husband and children. At first you think you are reading an off-kilter and off-the-cuff cookbook/self-help book. But as you continue, the narrative, which is casually interspersed with "girlfriend"-type advice, gains power and intimacy, and detail upon detail of everyday suburban domestic life finally coelesces into a touching memoir that is as ridiculous as it is wise. (And even though it doesn't, finally, turn out to be a cookbook, I actually made some of the recipes and they were great!)

Amazingly funny

This is a very funny book. It has the credibility, the ring of truth, without which slapstick, caricature, and wit are lifeless. It's like reading Dave Barry as an American, "Lucky Jim" as an academic, or Oscar Wilde as a ... never mind. Just read it.