A Better Woman

by Susan Johnson

In a poignant, intimate memoir, one of Australia's leading novelists offers a profound account of motherhood, describing the birth of her son on her relationship with her husband, her writing career, and her home, a situation made worse by a second pregancy with complications. 25,000 first printing.

Genres: Memoir, Australia, Family, Nonfiction, Biography

272 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1999

About the author

Susan Johnson was shortlisted for the 1991 Victorian Premier's Literary Award for her novel Flying Lessons, shortlisted for the 1994 National Book Council's Banjo Award for the novel A Big Life and shortlisted for the National Biography Award 2000 for her memoir A Better Woman. Her other books include Hungry Ghosts, Messages from Chaos, Women Love Sex (editor and contributor) and Life in Seven Mistakes. The Broken Book was shortlisted for the 2005 Nita B Kibble Award; the Best Fiction Book section of the Queensland Premier's Literary Award; the Westfield/Waverley Library Literary Award, and the Australian Literary Society Gold Medal Award for an Outstanding Australian Literary Work. Her last novel, My Hundred Lovers, was published in 2012 to critical acclaim.

Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name. This author is entered with 2 spaces.

Reviews

[Debbie Robson · Rating 4 out of 5]

It’s very easy to live in little boxes, feeling that a lot of people have it easier than us. They have more fame, more money and good health and are not worried about extra wrinkles. Of course this just isn’t the case but we can forget unless people like Susan Johnson and Norah Ephron talk or write about their own experiences.
Suddenly with a barrage of new wrinkles I found comfort in Ephron’s I Feel Bad About My Neck. I also used to think I had it tough with the birth of my first child. A serious medical condition prevented me from flying home to have my baby and I was stuck in the UK for twelve weeks until I delivered. Well, it was nothing on what Susan Johnson has gone through with the birth of her sons.
With searing honesty she relates what happened to her after delivering her first son. The damage to her body is extreme and almost catastrophic with the second delivery. This book though, isn’t just details of what happened to her physically - it chronicles the impact on her writing life and her long term relationship. How could she continue to write with a new baby and serious after effects to deal with? She had been managing on a small income as it was, living piecemeal. You can’t continue to do that with a demanding and difficult baby. And ill health.
I applaud her honesty regarding her income and how much effort and time she puts into each book. I have admired Susan from afar for years and thought her life as a published writer - who attended writing festivals, was interviewed in newspapers and on television - was effortless. I couldn’t have been more wrong. Another lesson that the grass isn’t always greener but we don’t know that unless people talk or write about their experiences.
Susan writes that this book “...exists simply because I am a writer and writing to me is like breathing. I did not become a writer as a career option; writing things down is the only way I now of existing.
Whether or not I need to publish my personal findings (or indeed whether anyone will be interested) is of course an entirely different matter. Here I offer you such reasons as money to feed myself and my children, an interested publisher who originally thought she was going to get a writer’s journal about the first year of motherhood but ended up with something else entirely, plus a desire on my part to bring to light the experience of one woman and mother because our stories have long been dismissed as trivial and ‘only’ domestic. If my particular story has resonance for just one reader I shall be happy.”
Well it has had resonance for this reader, helping me put into perspective what I experienced with the birth of my first and I’m sure this book will find it’s way to readers who need the comfort of knowing that Susan made it through and so can they.

[eRin · Rating 3 out of 5]

At the age of 35, Susan Johnson realizes that she desperately wants to be a mother. At 38 she is pregnant with her first child, moving back her to homeland of Australia, and getting ready to "settle." Although deliriously happy with her new baby and new life, she realizes that something isn't quite right and is soon diagnosed with a recto-vaginal fistula, something that is practically unheard of in the Western world (although prevalent in developing countries). This memoir is Susan's story--about life as a new, first-time, older mother. Settling down with a man who isn't really the settling down type. Attempting to remain a surviving writer. And dealing with a rare medical condition that can be painful, not to mention embarrassing and humiliating.

I really did not enjoy the book at first. It wasn't until about halfway through that I really started to not only get into the book, but really even cared about her story. She doesn't really talk about the fistula until the midway point, and I guess I was just waiting for that. It's probably also important to mention that I am not really a fan of "literary memoirs" (as my sister says: it's probably really great. I did not think the first half was great). I prefer the more gritty, real writing to the pretentious, flowery writing that she has. Looking back, I can see that the first half of the book was probably fine; it just didn't really have anything to do with the reason I picked up the book in the first place. One thing I loved, though; is that Johnson has some wonderful phrases that are immensely quotable. Example: "Having children exposes you. I will know who you are when I see how you wish your children to live." And "Isn't it a form of arrogance to assume that misfortune will not personally visit you, or to allow yourself to believe the man who says his love for you is endless as space?" I really liked that she got into a bit of feminist theory and quoted/discussed Germaine Greer. I also thought she had a wonderful observation on the recent prominence of what she describes as the "earth-mother hierarchy"--where the focus on getting back to natural childbirth, home births and midwives forgets that "birth involves danger." Overall, I enjoyed the book a lot. And when I forget about the first half, I love it.

[SHR · Rating 4 out of 5]

I found this book refreshing in its portrayal of motherhood.

It is about Johnson’s experience of becoming a mother and the impact of getting a recto-vaginal fistula as a result of the births of her two sons and the subsequent treatment she had to undergo – how this impacted her relationships and self-image.

She explores how motherhood changed her life and in particular her place in the world, as a writer, as well as her pre- and post- motherhood views on parenting.
Johnson was candid about her changing feelings about being a mother; she expressed rage, feelings of being helpless and inadequate, as well as feelings of bliss and being overcome by love and protective instincts.
“In reality I am the good mother and I am the bad mother; I am the good woman and the bad woman caught in the same net of skin.” She recognized that motherhood is usually presented through a whimsical, purely joyous filter and rejected that, for the crap it is – yeah!

She also examined the way she had to adjust her attitude to the level of control she exerts on her life and body and her struggle to do this. She called it a kind of arrogance of the young, who all seem to think negative things only happen to other people.

I found this book made me contemplate my own attitudes, which was illuminating.

I found her writing easy to digest and quite poetic at times.

[Hannah · Rating 1 out of 5]

Pretentious and too raw for me.

[Sonya Feher · Rating 2 out of 5]

A Better Woman couldn't decide what it was about, or maybe it was a case of the publisher billing the book as something other than it actually is. The focus shifts from Johnson's pregnancies and their lasting physical complications, her troubled marriage, and her difficulties writing once the babies come. The result is something less than satisfactory because nothing is fully explored and there are no great revelations.

[Chrissie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think this is more like a 3.5 for me. one note - I wouldn't recommend this to women who are pregnant or plan to become pregnant! (sounds like some sort of warning from a drug company!)She experiences some crazy physical stuff that does not happen to many women. So if you're squeamish, you might not want to read it quite yet. But now everyone's going to want to read it to find out what happens to her...

[miteypen · Rating 3 out of 5]

An uncomfortable topic written about sensitively. But I do agree with another reviewer that this was sort of a mixed bag. A good deal of it is an essay on motherhood and life and I think this is where the author is at her best. Then there is the memoir part which is basically about her physical trauma from childbirth. She throws in excerpts about house buying, relocating, her marriage and her writing.

[Bronwyn Rykiert · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this for book club and I think we will be able to have quite a good discussion on it because I already know that a couple of people did not enjoy it at all. I found it easy to read, some of it was enjoyable and some of it just intereesting. I found myself reflecting back to my own children when they were young along the way. All in all I found this book to be a good read.

[Rebecca Blackson · Rating 4 out of 5]

After a terrible complication from childbirth, this woman remains optimistic despite her challenges and learns that all her sacrifices to be a mother is forever worth it. My favorite line: "Our children are our most beautiful wishes."

[Deborah Biancotti · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this a few years ao & what I remember is Johnson's searing honesty & thoughtful articulation of being a woman in a woman's body when things go so badly wrong you feel like that body has betrayed you.

[Crystal · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dark, graphic and hard to read at times but now that I finished it I find myself feeling like I enjoyed the experience.