Mother Land

Theroux possesses a fabulously nasty sense of humor. -- Stephen King <em>New York Times Book Review</em> <p/> To those in her Cape Cod town Mother is an exemplar of piety frugality and hard work. To her husband and seven children she is a selfish petty tyrant. She excels at playing her offspring against each other. Her favorite Angela died in childbirth; only Angela really understands her she tells the others. The others include the officious lawyer Fred; the uproarious professor Floyd; a pair of inseparable sisters whose devotion to Mother has consumed their lives; and JP the narrator a successful writer whose work she disparages. As she lives well past the age of one hundred her brood struggles with and among themselves to shed her viselike hold on them. <br><em> Mother Land</em> is a piercing portrait of how a parent's narcissism impacts a family. While the particulars of his tale are unique Paul Theroux encapsulates with acute clarity and wisdom a circumstance that is familiar to millions of readers. <p/> Paul Theroux ladles a steaming cup of dysfunctional-family chowder in <em>Mother Land</em>. -- <em>Vanity Fair</em> <p/><em>An engrossing emotionally tangled and often merciless examination of family and self . . . </em><em>Mother Land</em><em> is a bittersweet brutally frank family saga that offers enough redemption to make the journey worth it. -- </em><em>Shelf Awareness</em>