This Is How It Always Is

Laurie Frankel is a magician who balances so many different bits of magic in this book -- from fairy tales to messy families (yes, yes, I have a type), to essential social issues -- while mostly just making us cry and laugh at regular intervals. Like I said, a magician.

A friend was raving about this book and I initially resisted reading it because I wasn't drawn to the subject, but immediately was drawn in, learned a lot, changed my mind about some things.

This doubles as one of my favorite novels and also a treasured parenting how-to book. It’s a poignant reminder that motherhood is pure on-the-job learning and that you’ll probably never get it just right. I learned so much about parenting my own children from the story of Rosie and her husband, Penn, who are parents to a little boy, Claude, who wants to be a girl.

This book captures the true essence of parenting: Rosie and Penn love Claude fiercely and do what they believe is best to support their child—only to discover later that their choices were deeply flawed.… show more.