Year My Mother Came Back

A Memoir

By: Alice Cohen

Narrated by: Alice Cohen

Length: 5 hrs and 53 mins

Publisher's summary

As it turns out, it's entirely possible for the people we've lost to come back to us when we need them the most. Although letting her mother back into her life is not an easy thing, Alice navigates it with humor, intelligence, and honesty. What she learns is that she must revisit her childhood, and allow herself to be a daughter once more, in order to take care of her own girls. Eventually, understanding and then forgiving her mother's parenting transgressions leads her to accept herself and to the realization that she doesn't have to be perfect to be a good mother.

©2015 Alice Eve Cohen (P)2015 HighBridge, a division of Recorded Books

Critic reviews

"A riveting journey... funny, painful, absurd, and heartwarming. Alice's mother comes fully to life in all her complexity, a woman of her times and ahead of her time. Alice's own struggle to accept her imperfect self is a loving message to mothers who struggle to live life with grace. A beautiful book." (Julie Metz, New York Times best-selling author of Perfection)

"Alice Cohen navigates what was a perfect storm of a year, a year when doubt, guilt, dread, illness, and sorrow descended all at once on her and on her family. What she made of this year is a book so honest, so moving, and ultimately so wise, that it is a privilege to take the journey with her. The Year My Mother Came Back is a perfect book. I want to tell everyone, every mother, every daughter, to read it." (Abigail Thomas, author of A Three Dog Life and Safekeeping: Some True Stories From a Life)

"Alice Eve Cohen's warm, witty, wise memoir is an elixir of love. It captures the struggles of every woman who ever wanted to be a better mother or daughter... Read it and weep... and laugh... and love. But do read it!" (Nancy Bachrach, author of The Center of the Universe: A Memoir)

Boring

What could have made this a 4 or 5-star listening experience for you?

A better story; definitely a different narrator.

Would you ever listen to anything by Alice Cohen again?

Doubtful

How could the performance have been better?

The narrator sounded like she was reading to 3 year old children.

You didn’t love this book... but did it have any redeeming qualities?

None that I can think of.

Any additional comments?

This was a book club choice - out of 10 people, only 2 liked it even a little bit.