Intimate and honest look at a mother’s struggle with post-partum depression and anxiety. In this respect it is quite good, it doesn’t shy away from the worst aspects and the worst thoughts that can cross a new mother’s mind. The mixed emotions and loss of identity the result from parenthood are the main focus, and they are not treated as shameful but as something which should be worked through patiently.

My issue is with the level of exposition. The reader is not given much to figure out for themselves, with every little detail laid out as clearly as possible at every opportunity. For example, the narrator often simply tells us her feelings—literally ‘I am disappointed’—sometimes this is fine, sometimes it feels redundant. 

The narrative is split between the post-partum period, the ~year before ‘Button’ is born, and ‘letters’ to Button from that year. These segments are broken up at times by search histories, which are used as another form of exposition to tell the reader that the character is experiencing post-partum depression/anxiety, and to repeat other details discussed immediately prior. Personally I feel the pace would have been better with a higher page count and a more integrated exposition, or cutting it out entirely.

In all, its strength is in its thematic focus. The author succeeds in showing us the narrator’s emotional journey through post-partum in both honest depictions and subtle changes in the writing style—I only wish the changes had not occurred at the very end, and that this journey had been less padded with attempts to ensure the reader knew *exactly* what the author meant at any given moment.

***Note on the content warnings:

Most of what I have added is based on the intrusive thoughts the narrator has regarding harming her baby, ways her baby may be harmed, the future, and one instance of paranoia her husband might assault the child. The ‘Graphic’ ones are labelled as such due to their frequency more than actual detail. ‘Minor’ are brought up only once. And the Abandonment relates to the narrators desire to run away.

A VERY SLOW book… I was 80% in thinking that a whole 3 months has passed in the book, before the narrator mentions “a week”. The idea is educational and informative, giving readers a first-hand look into the ruminative mind of a new mother with post-partum depression.

I appreciated the endless, cyclical, spiraling rumination of the narrator that shows how isolating and agonising post-partum depression (or just motherhood) can be. The writer did not shy away from truths, thoughts that mothers can have, even if they were pretty heavy & appalling thoughts (intrusive thoughts about hurting one’s baby, contemplating the potential of your spouse sexually abusing your child). I also liked that the writer veered into the hallucinatory, allowing the reader to witness how isolated a new mother can feel. Which parts were figments of the narrator’s imagination and which parts weren’t? 

The depiction of a loving yet clueless husband was also great- I thought it showed accurately how even the men who love us will never understand the entire experience of birth, of creation from one’s body, of motherhood and its physical demands, its brutality.

I’m not too sure of the rest of the execution though.. the timeline between chapters is confusing, it alternates between pre and post-birth; although time (or the lack of time, the lack of keeping track of time) is a huge theme in this as the narrator is so overwhelmed with fatigue that she isn’t of sound mind. I just don’t see this lack of clarity in chapter timeline serving this theme in any way.  

Then there’s the thing with the upstairs neighbour, I don’t really get that part/character and its purpose…

I’ve never read such a hyper-realistic story that felt so much like horror. 

This book found me just as my mind was starting to tell itself postpartum wasn’t that bad and was a gut punch and a hug at the same time.

The Nursery is the most faithful (to my experience) depiction of the postpartum period that I’ve read so far. Having recently been through it, I had a hard time not projecting and comparing, down to the accordion played by the neighbor.

The stream of consciousness-esque style, the interlocking timelines and uninterrupted narration really come together to paint the picture of new motherhood, and it’s raw and nasty and scary and stained by various fluids. I didn’t know I was hungry for a book like this, for the intrusive thoughts to be staring at me from the page, to cement that I was not alone in my experience. And that it ultimately does get better.

Thank you to Oneworld Publications and NetGalley for providing this ARC.