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Chandler Baker's Reading List for Exhausted and Fed Up Women

Posted by Cybil on July 19, 2021
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Chandler Baker is a mystery writer who knows how to deftly turn sly observations of women's lives into...well, murder plots. Fresh from her corporate thriller The Whisper Network, which was selectedÌýby Reece Witherspoon for , Baker is back with a Stepford Wives-gender flip pageturner, The Husbands. In honor of her new book which hits U.S. stores on Aug. 3, we asked Baker to recommend books for anyone who feels that having it all just means doing it all.Ìý
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Not long ago, my husband, kids, and I piled into the car for a weekend trip with another family. Once there, both dads fell asleep for a midday nap and we, the moms, decided to let them sleep while we watched our collective four children.

When the dads woke up, we mentioned our plan to get in a thirty-minute at-home workout and asked that they wrangle the kids during that time. Five minutes in, we were doing pushups with toddlers on our backs, squats with kids hanging off our thighs, crunches with children sitting on our stomachs.

And although the dads did attempt to shepherd the kids away, they surrendered with protests of, “We can’t help it! They want to be with you!� And I thought: Wow, this is a perfect physical manifestation of how life feels right now. I’m out there trying to do all the things women are supposed to—pursuing a career, negotiating for higher pay, practicing self-care, dating my spouse, exercising, keeping passably up-to-date on fashion trends—but I’m so loaded down.
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Part of that, I think, is because there’s this burgeoning idea that women having-it-all means women needing to do All The Things in order to feel self-actualized and fulfilled. Meanwhile, I find myself thinking: wait, what—fulfilled? Women are full!

We hear over and over that we aren’t enough. Not thin enough, not pretty enough, not stylish enough, and now we’ve added to it—not successful enough, not professional enough, not tough enough. What’s the natural reaction to hearing “not enough� over and over and over? It’s to take more. To shovel the more onto ourselves so that no one can accuse us of not being enough. We “fulfill� ourselves to overflowing. We spill. We slip.
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And I think where so many women are right now is: Enough! As in Enough Enough.
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One of my greatest joys in life is long talks with my girlfriends. Female friendships are so special in part because women feel close by sharing the details of their lives. Mundane minutia is our social currency. And wow is it so much easier to hear all these life details from a friend, nod your head knowingly, and say, “You’re doing a great job. You’re crushing it� than it is to speak kindly to yourself. The women in my life just GET IT and they do the same for me.

But, let’s be real, sometimes trying to schedule a call or—if you can imagine—a lunch with a friend is next to impossible, what with trying to get dinner on the table and sticking to nap times and online shopping for that blue-of-any-shade bridesmaid dress you meant to order three months ago.

So what I’ve been grateful to find is that certain books can be that sounding board, too. They can make me feel seen and remind me that other women are exhausted and fed up just like me. I hope that if you’re reading this, you might find a knowing head nod from these books precisely when you need it.

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I discovered Hartley’s book through her excellent essay �.� If you need a wise woman to lend vocabulary to the frustrations you’re feeling about the division of domestic labor and the draining toll of the emotional component of that, then, in my opinion, you’d be hard-pressed to do better than to read Hartley’s work.


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Kate Reddy is a working mother who is suffering from a severe time shortage and trying to juggle all the glass balls in the air, praying none of them will break. This book is achingly relatable and also hilarious—because sometimes we just need to laugh about how ridiculous trying to do it all is. Bonus: The novel was later turned into a movie starring Sarah Jessica Parker.Ìý


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I have given this extremely accessible collection of poems to many women in my life, women whom I wish would see themselves the way I see them. Baer’s poems examine the many roles of women—partner, mother, and friend. Some of my favorites include, “Like a Wife� and “Moon Song.�


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I’m pretty sure no list about the modern woman experience would be complete without including at least one Meg Wolitzer book. Unlike the mothers in this book, I didn’t hit snooze on my career for the first ten years of my children’s lives, but I can still deeply relate to having been told that our generation would have it so differently than our mothers, that we truly would have it all, and the resulting frustration when the reality falls short.


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This is an adorable Australian picture book and nod to Maurice Sendak’s classic about the day an exhausted mother didn’t get dressed and went on strike only to find herself crossing time and space to where the Wild Mums live. Perfect for any mother who needs a break (which I think is probably all of us, right?)


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Bernadette is a frustrated artist, mother and wife, who is so fed up that she’s basically opted out of everything in her life, hiring a remote personal assistant to take care of it for her instead. Extra credit for reading Maria Semple’s follow-up, Today Will Be Different, which I loved just as much.


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This is a brilliant, unnerving novel about an artist turned stay-at-home-mom who, during early motherhood, believes she is turning into a dog and struggles to control her new canine impulses. Need I say more?


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I love all of Roxane Gay’s essays, but I think this one in particular speaks to women who will feel a kinship in examining the exhausting emotional and psychological struggles women are too-often saddled with as it pertains to food and body image.Ìý


Do you have any book recommendations like these for your fellow readers? Share your picks in the comments below!

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Comments Showing 1-8 of 8 (8 new)

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message 1: by Victoria (new)

Victoria Gone Girl anyone? Just kidding �


message 2: by Aenea (new)

Aenea Jones Pro Tip for not getting exhausted and fed up: Don't have kids.


message 3: by Emily (new)

Emily What a great and diverse list! I'm super excited for The Husbands to come out.


message 4: by Gilbert (new)

Gilbert Perhaps a little humor may be in order: An Essay on the Art of Ingeniously Tormenting by Jane Collier An Essay on the Art of Ingeniously Tormenting by Jane Collier,


message 5: by Laura (new)

Laura Wilson I would add Mediocre to this list.


message 6: by Jamie (new)

Jamie Oh god, the never ending argument of "I'll do it, you just have to ask," and the whole point of not having to ask someone to put their damn clothes away. Why women constantly need to "nag" for their partners to do basic chores. They should know it needs to be done because they have eyes in which to see with. Rather just do it myself than to constantly ask for it to get done. Better yet, no one does it and we will just see how long it takes for the partner to do it on their own, what is the critical point that they will finally embrace their autonomy and determine on their own that this needs to be done and I should do it.


message 7: by Jezzy (new)

Jezzy Aenea wrote: "Pro Tip for not getting exhausted and fed up: Don't have kids."

100% agree! life is already a struggle. having children will make things get more complicated.


message 8: by Anthony (new)

Anthony English Interesting list. As a balance to the current obsession with 'the trials of womanhood', I wonder if anyone at GR would have the courage to come up with a Reading List for Exhausted and Fed Up Men? Probably not possible as no publisher would be inclined or game to publish relevant books.


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