A Woman Is A Woman Until She Is A Mother by Anna Prushinskaya

In this collection of eleven essays, author Anna Prushinskaya discusses one of the common threads tying women together, that of motherhood.  She wrote these essays while she was pregnant with her first child and then after the birth of her son.  She discusses such topics as the feelings of being pregnant, labor itself, the change that pregnancy and birth makes in a woman's life and how motherhood and outside employment interact.

In the essays, several themes emerge.  Prushinskaya brings in the Russian influences of her heritage and she discusses the thoughts of prominent feminists about the topics of women and childbirth and of becoming a mother.  Her family emigrated from Russia in 1998 and she became a citizen in 2008.  She discusses the quandary of bringing into an imperfect world a being one loves immediately and wishes the best for.  She talks about the uncertainty of pregnancy; not knowing when labor will begin or how things will turn out.  She talks about the changes one undergoes immediately after childbirth as a new world is entered.  Readers, especially women, will be interested in this unique take on one of the common experiences that bind women together.  This book is recommended for nonfiction readers and those interested in the female experience.