Rating: 
Summary: Vacuous, New Age Drivel
Review: This book is, quite frankly, horrible. It conveys the "struggle" of a self-indulgent female from an upper-middle class background who has to make an agonizing "choice" between a high-powered career and motherhood. After spending several years studying and partying at a prestigious university, the author went on to pursue a high-powered career that left her feeling "empty" and "spiritually unfulfilled." After studying transcendental meditation and attempting other dubious New Age panaceas, she tried something truly groundbreaking--she married a well-to-do male and started producing babies. Come on! I find it hard to feel sorry or sympathetic for a woman who has never known true hardship or struggle. This book has nothing to say to millions of women for whom the combination of work and motherhood is not a choice but a necessity. I recommend reading Barbara Ehrenreich's "Nickled and Dimed" to understand the choices women have to make in the REAL world. Surrendering to motherhood is nothing but a 212 page guilt trip aimed at both working women and the men who love them.
Rating: 
Summary: This book is a mixed bag....
Review: This book provides some valid insights on the nitty gritty of mothering young children, but I think that Ms. Krasnow's "surrender" sounds a lot like the many other episodes of revelation she's experienced in love, religion and work - intense and temporary. The fact that she has a profession that allows her to work freelance and from home, and that her husband supports her in a lifestyle that also provides for a part-time nanny, makes me question the extent of her "surrender". Although she professes a respect for other women's choices, the message of this book is that anything less than a stay-at-home mother represents a disservice to one's children. As a full time professional and mother of 8&10 year old children, I don't buy it - and given that Ms. Krasnow managed to pump this book out between egg-scraping episodes - I don't think she really does either.
Rating: 
Summary: You can be a happy, fulfilled mother
Review: This book was just what I needed! I have a 2 1/2 year old, 1 1/2 year old and am 5 months preg. Most days it's been hard to find happiness in all the messes, meals, mood swings, etc. that I have to shoulder. But Krasnows view of motherhood is overwhelmingly uplifting in an era when a woman wants to pursue her own childhood dreams. If your having trouble finding happiness and reassurance that being a mother first is truly the most important thing you could and should ever do, this book is great!!!!!!!
Rating:
Summary: You can be a happy, fulfilled mother
Review: This book was just what I needed! I have a 2 1/2 year old, 1 1/2 year old and am 5 months preg. Most days it's been hard to find happiness in all the messes, meals, mood swings, etc. that I have to shoulder. But Krasnows view of motherhood is overwhelmingly uplifting in an era when a woman wants to pursue her own childhood dreams. If your having trouble finding happiness and reassurance that being a mother first is truly the most important thing you could and should ever do, this book is great!!!!!!!
Rating: 
Summary: "Finding Your Soul"? .... Or Finding Contempt?
Review: This book was such a disappointment to me. I believe there are many avenues to spiritual growth and that motherhood is certainly one of the most powerful. However, the author's ambivalence about motherhood screams from the pages. Much of the author's pages are devoted to judging and condemning those who have had made different choices from her: non-mothers. Of course, let's not forget that the author is permitted to make such bitter, judging statements about non-mothers -- after all, she's "been there, done that"! Please. Hatred is hatred, no matter how prettily you package it. I don't want the kind of spirituality the author professes to have. I know from experience that motherhood is wonderful and deeply fulfilling. However, if I had to base my opinions solely upon this book, I would read between the lines and imagine motherhood to be a teeth-clenching, agonizing task which causes one to be envious of those without children -- causing one to skillfully toss angry, acidic comments their way .... I think I'll stick to Thomas Merton and Mother Teresa's books on spirituality. They are kinder and more loving to those who are unlike them.
Rating:
Summary: I'd rather have my mind.
Review: This is pretty sickening. The title says it all -- losing your mind, finding your soul. If I were a mother, I would be insulted. So much for strong, independent womanhood.
Rating: 
Summary: Viva Ozzie and Harriet?
Review: This reads just like a magazine article: light, chatty, and lots of little personal anecdotes and mini-descriptions of other women's experiences. I sped right through it. Four kids so close together, though, is pretty intense. And, apparently, they are all still quite young. It doesn't seem as if she has a lot of perspective, time-wise that is, to talk from. Some of us spread our kids out more, and do juggle stuff just fine. Her all or nothing conclusion seems rooted in her choice to have so many kids so quick. Also, I'm the mom of only boys, too, and I felt a little uncomfortable with her implied assumptions about them being so different from girls. Bottom-line, she seems to have really bought into Ozzie and Harriet, to the exclusion of the real world.
Rating:
Summary: Finding my Soul "sister"
Review: when our identical twin daughters were in their early twos, I found myself going "mad" with their demands and the demands that I put on myself as a stay-at-home telecommuting mother/publicist and healthcare professional in private practice in a university town on the prairie. i would stop off at our small bookstore/coffeehouse and stare into space until wone afternoon I found myself staring into the bookshelves. There it was...the spine of Krasnow's "surrendering to Motherhood". I picked it up and over the course of the next six months I did it over and over again each time I visited the coffeehouse. I finally purchased that copy, and have read and reread it. It has been a lifeline to my own sanity, a guaranteed chuckle when I feel like sobbing and has given me a thread of hope that I am not alone in my longing to sit all day and watch my girls at play. I don't know if it's great literature or light magazine article reading, and frankly I don't care what others think, I just know that it has been my friend and I think I am clearer and a better mom for its presence on my desk. Thanks Iris,
Rating:
Summary: yawn
Review: Women old enough to remember the l950's will realize there's nothing new here. Anyone who thought the backlash was over will revise her thinking after reading this book. Krasnow waxes poetic on the subject of stay-at-home motherhood and makes a few good observations. What she doesn't do is explain what the woman who sacrifices all for family is supposed to do if she finds herself a single mother with a husband who doesn't pay child support, or a 55-year-old displaced homemaker with nothing to show for her troubles but an ex-husband who's found a younger model and grown children who seldom phone. The author fails to explain why only women are expected to put themselves in this precarious position. I could have sworn it took two people to create a child. One senses a certain amount of dishonesty here, in that the author has managed to turn out a book while preaching the joys of total self-surrender to family. To be fair, Krasnow writes well. If only she had something to say...
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