Fire up a book discussion group with Jessamine Chan’s dystopian debut, The School for Good Mothers.

Thirty-nine-year-old Frida starts the book exhausted. She’s a single mother barely balancing her job demands with parenting her toddler on her best days. When her ex and his partner drop Harriet off with an ear infection, and Harriet screams in pain for three straight days, Frida snaps. She makes a very bad decision to leave Harriet alone, and is caught.  After a nightmarish period of surveillance by Child Protection Services, a judge offers Frida a choice: spend a year at the state-funded parent education center, or terminate her parental rights. Frida chooses the school. The consequences are shocking.

I binged this tightly plotted book like it was a Netflix show, and maybe that’s why certain parts reminded me of The Handmaid’s Tale or Orange is the New Black. I’d suggest recruiting at least one friend to read with because there is much to discuss–this book is so unsettling.

I can’t wait to hear what the author has to say when she and Emily Maloney join the library over Zoom on Wednesday, May 25th.