A solid, if opinionated, look at parenting from a teacher’s perspective.
A veteran teacher shares parenting lessons learned from her students.
In this debut guide, Essalat offers parents insights derived from her work as a teacher and principal. The book covers both practical tips—for instance, when students make negative comments about themselves or their classmates, she requires them to create a list of positives on the same subject—and a broader argument. She makes the case in favor of establishing high expectations, stepping back to allow children to make mistakes and learn from them, and establishing lifelong habits of independence and self-reliance. The chapters are organized thematically, and each includes anecdotes from the author’s teaching experiences—she is not a parent herself, which she acknowledges from the outset. She also delivers concrete suggestions for parents to implement with their children to improve family relations, school performance, and general preparedness for adult life. The topics will be familiar to many readers of parenting books, from social media use and respectful behavior to managing homework and having productive conversations. But with its focus on the collaborative relationship between parents and teachers, the book presents a unique viewpoint. The writing is generally strong and well informed, based on practical experience and a solid understanding of child development. (Both references and additional resources are included in the backmatter.) But Essalat’s tone can be alarmist at times, particularly regarding social media (she tells students they are “putting our entire community in jeopardy” by posting videos that include the school’s name), as well as judgmental (“If someone isn’t going to make the time, have the time, spend the time with their own kids, then why have them at all?”). She also displays a touch of kids-these-days exasperation (“Just how little our kids appreciate things anymore”). For readers who appreciate the back-to-basics, traditionalist tone of the book, it can be a useful collection of advice and strategies for strengthening relationships with children and helping them to succeed in school. The volume also supplies a well-crafted insider’s perspective on how teachers view their students and how parents can best work with them.
A solid, if opinionated, look at parenting from a teacher’s perspective.Pub Date: Oct. 13, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-951412-05-0
Page Count: 145
Publisher: The Collective Book Studio
Review Posted Online: Oct. 20, 2020
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
The benefits and headaches of later-life motherhood from a candid, often hilarious comedic mind.
A comedian offers a humorous assessment of parenting.
Leggero’s journey into motherhood began when she froze her eggs at age 38 while still single, thinking “maybe one day I might want a kid, in the same way I thought I might eventually want an infinity hot tub.” When she was 42, happily married and eager to be a mother, she and her husband began what she describes as a vigorous (and ultimately successful) in-vitro fertilization process. The author also recounts her life’s journey. She was an overachieving child who grew up with “an overwhelmed single mother” in Rockford, Illinois, and she studied theater in college. She shares amusing anecdotes about taking acting classes with a not-yet-famous Paris Hilton and ascending the ranks of the Hollywood improv comedy circuit. Leggero gets real about the more difficult aspects of motherhood, including the evaporation of free time (“the end to all fun”), child discipline, anxiety, and “cleaning up after my husband.” Nonetheless, she wouldn’t change a thing, and her daughter has become a “new reason to live.” Many aspects of her motherhood journey will resonate with a wide variety of readers, including breastfeeding and pandemic-era parenting, though she satirically skewers just about everything else with gleeful abandon. As one would expect from a former Chelsea Lately guest panelist (73 appearances), Leggero’s snark comes fast and furious throughout biting quips about nannies and the terror of having her elderly parents babysit. Occasionally, the humor feels forced—e.g., when she is mockingly critical of her husband, dubbing his Judaism as “the religion my husband forced me to convert to,” though she ultimately concedes he was “worth giving up Christmas for.” Leggero also straightforwardly addresses her reasons for not wanting another child, and overall, she achieves a commendable balance among practical advice, wry commentary, and over-the-top offensiveness.
The benefits and headaches of later-life motherhood from a candid, often hilarious comedic mind.Pub Date: Nov. 15, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-982137-07-6
Page Count: 288
Publisher: Gallery Books/Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Sept. 13, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2022
A clear-eyed survey of the tradeoffs of elite youth competition.
Journalist Murray chronicles his experiences as the parent of a soccer-loving daughter.
This memoir offers an eye-opening account of the hypercompetitive world of elite travel soccer—the primary pathway for most American players to top-level collegiate programs. As it happens, college soccer coaches don’t spend much time watching high school games; instead, they recruit players at regional tournaments, which bring together myriad talented players from a wide area. Murray knew very little about soccer when his young daughter started playing in a mid-2000s “Lil’ Kickers” program in Chicago—and he knew even less about travel soccer. In these pages, he aims to educate parents in similar circumstances. To that end, his book describes the joys and camaraderie of competitive athletics, but it dwells more on the challenges that families face—specifically detailing the financial strains and the tremendous time commitments required by competitive travel sports. Over the course of the book, Murray notes the pressures that the sport put on his family life, which became dominated by his daughter’s college-sports ambitions; the sport was no longer a source of recreation, he writes, but a means to an end. One of the book’s most striking aspects is its discussion of how parents get children involved in sports at very young ages; Murray’s own daughter started at the age of 3, and he writes about a parent who recommended a specific coach for 4-year-olds. The author also effectively notes that many parents voiced disapproval of parents “living vicariously” through their child’s athletic accomplishments: “That’s not said much anymore, because it would hit too close to too many homes.”
A clear-eyed survey of the tradeoffs of elite youth competition.Pub Date: April 14, 2026
ISBN: 9781633311374
Page Count: 140
Publisher: Disruption Books
Review Posted Online: Oct. 2, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
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