The Leopard Hat: A Daughter's Story

by Valerie Steiker

This indelible story of a mother and daughter opens with a magical childhood on the Upper East Side of New York. At its heart is Valerie Steiker’s mother, Gisèle, a Belgian Jew who, as a child, was hidden from the Nazis during World War II. As an adult, Gisèle developed a large appetite for joy, beauty, and spontaneity, tempered only by her old-world superstitions and protectiveness. The apartment on Madison Avenue where she and her husband raised two daughters overflowed with books, musical instruments, velvet-lined boxes, Gisèle’s flamboyant wardrobe, and, above all, love and warmth.

When Gisèle died during her daughter’s junior year at Harvard, Steiker’s challenge was to preserve the enveloping glow of her mother’s presence even as she stepped outside of it. With grace and humor, she explores her girlhood and adolescence and the crucial growing pains of her twenties. She falls in love; she moves to Paris for a year on her own; she returns home to find her mother still absent. Layering episodes in her own life with those of her mother’s, she often sees Gisèle illuminated in her own experiences.

The Leopard Hat is an intimate account of loss and reconciliation, and of the unshakable bond between a mother and daughter; it is, finally, the celebration of a young woman’s vivacious emergence into adulthood.

Genres: Memoir, Nonfiction

336 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2002

Reviews

[Sandy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a marvelous memoir... rich in wonderful detail of a happy child's family and life in 60's New York. Her opening descriptions of her mother's beauty parlor was right out of my childhood... not so much the 'going to', as my mother did not, but of the knowing about and imagining the lives of those who DID patronize such places.... and the images of her family's apartment on Madison Avene, of her mother's wonderful foibles and eccentricities, of her eclectic tastes and her standards of behaviour and decorum..... all a bygone day, which I very much grew up on the periphery of..... really wonderful. I am loving the energetic and enthusiastic characters described, the joys and fun-in-growing up that Valerie and her sister Stephanie experienced with an extremely loving and positive mother and father.... a truly marvelous and rich book, especially for any and all of us who may have once lived in that world or on its edges.

on page 166: This book is extra ordinary.... not 'extraordinary!' with all the word's fanfare overuse, but rather it is 'extra' 'ordinary', a superb narration of love and loss and joy. Natalie's descriptive prose is vibrant and alive. The story she weaves about her mother's life rich and nearly sensuous. It is a joy to read, each page a gem. I look forward to every page to come.

"Despite everything, even the man himself, my mother loves him, his brute strength, his cruelty." How often it is that we women get caught in that web of adoration of a bastard. Amazing and amazingly provocatively written!

[Sarah Sammis · Rating 2 out of 5]

I picked up The Leopard Hat right after Harriet was born at a local BookCrossing meeting. I'd recently enjoyed some other memoirs and I liked the leopard spotted cover.

The Leopard Hat is Valerie Steiker's memories of her mother, Gisèle who died unexpectedly of breast cancer when the author was in college. The loss of a loved one, especially one as close as a dearly loved parent is difficult and sad. Writing this memoir was part of the healing process for Steiker but I wish I had spent my time reading a different memoir instead.

Steiker grew up in the sort of families that the New York Times is always covering — the ones who stress over au pairs, private preschools and all sorts of other luxuries that leave the rest of us scratching our heads over. So when Steiker, as an adult is looking back on her childhood and bemoaning how hard it is to do things for herself now that her mother is gone, I find myself thinking of Lenina Crowne from Brave New World who has been so programmed by society to be infantile in her needs and desires.

I realize I'm being overly harsh but I didn't have much to relate to while reading this book beyond my own love of my mother. Readers who are familiar with New York, have traveled in Europe and lived the single life into their thirties will probably come away with more from the is book than I did.

[troyerlaw · Rating 5 out of 5]

Beautiful tribute to her mother, but also a wistful, layered account of growing up, saying goodbye, starting to figure out what the adult self and life will look like.

[Kate · Rating 2 out of 5]

I picked this up randomly from the Memoir shelf at the library. So far it is has a basic, pretty uninspired writing style. The author clearly had an interesting mother, but there is a sense of worship that I find a little disconcerting. The author's mother did die when she was in college, so perhaps that leads to really only knowing your mother from a child's perspective which is why there seems to be such an uncritical eye. Sadly, most of the book just seems to be an outlining of how cool she and her family and friends are. Even when she describes her loss, it ended up being tainted by "well I was working at the New Yorker at the time" or "my trip to India after her death just reminded me of the awesome trip we took there when I was a kid because I had the bestest parents ever." I felt one-upped the entire time.

[Heidi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reviews on Amazon were mixed because of the writing style but I really enjoyed the book. If you stopped in the first section, you might go away thinking Steiker was telling the same old tale of Upper East Side privilege, but that isn't the most important part of the story at all. The shelter that her parents provided to Valerie and her sister was remarkable to me - emotional and physical. Perhaps the truest part of the memoir is the ending, when both her parents - now dead - can be remembered instead of described. I could so relate to her description of the process of sorting through her parents things, trying to decide what to keep and what to give away; how each object had a story and those stories were a cruel joy to remember. Worth it. For the New York stories, the clothes, the reflection of a life.

[Arleen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found the introductory chapters of this book to be somewhat reminiscent of other memoirs written by articulate, creative upper middle class women. I didn't feel a connection to the lifestyle. However, as it progresses, I am finding Steiker's story to be multi-layered with the sensitivity of a daughter who appreciates her mother's idiosyncratic lifestyle as part of her upbringing and cultural expectations. I am finding the author's ability to understand her own changes in perception as an adult reflecting on her childhood to be enlightening. This message is far more universal as the reader moves beyond the canvas of the beautifully written, introductory chapters detailing her family's wealthy lifestyle. It becomes more of a story of mother and daughter, and the connections one can make with maturity and the passage of time. Still reading and looking forward to more.

[Lauren Alfrey · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read The Leopard Hat during a very lonely summer in college, spent in a strange city with few friends. I can remember being very engrossed with this book (possibly because of my lacking social life, but more likely because this book was really good!), and admiring Steiker's bold yet vulnerable voice as she investigates her own identity through her mother's history. There were parts that moved me to tears. From what I can remember, Steiker's voice was really the compelling aspect of this novel. I hope to read it again soon to recapture the feelings this story originally left me with.

[Margi · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed this memoir. She has such great descriptions of not only the relationship, but if the era and place as well. When she was in France, India, or any other place, you could really visualize it. The relationships between mother and daughter and then father and daughter later where very interesting to me. My favorite part was truly about the Leopard hat she finds in Paris and how it makes her feel and the feelings it invokes in her. For this who enjoy mother daughter memoirs, this is a good one.

[Michelle Krasovich · Rating 4 out of 5]

This charming memoir takes the reader through the world of the Steiker family. Their world is a happy one, filled with love, style, books and simply, all good things in life. The author takes us through the life and adventures of her mother, Gisèle Neiman, an extraordinary woman who raised her daughters with such élan and grace. With the death of Gisèle, there is sadness, but the memory of her life brings a certain beauty and a understanding. In short, I simply loved this book.

[Liga · Rating 4 out of 5]

good, good. this is another book that easily conjures (do i put 'up' after 'conjure'?) images from films, other books, other cities, places, new york, of course, among them. however, there were a little too many things in there - in those images, in the story. things that i found hard to relate to. due to the soviet past, i think.

[melanie (lit*chick) · Rating 4 out of 5]

I remember Anna Quindlen recommending this (along with Beekeeper's Apprentice) on the Today show a few years ago and it has taken me all this time to read it.
A lovely counterpoint to all the hard knock life memoirs currently filling up the shelves. The book shines when the author is describing her mother, less so when she talks about herself, but still a worthwhile read.

[Jill · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think that the author needed a better editor (again). There were really good parts of this, but the lack of unity, lack of any sort of organizing principle didn't work for me. It was as if she wrote a series of essays, rather than a non-fiction memoir. I actually wanted to know her mother better, rather than hear so much about the author.

[Kiessa · Rating 1 out of 5]

I am sorry to say that I thought this book was utterly awful. It seemed to me to be the shallow musings of a desperately materialistic, elitist woman incapable of self-reflection who worshipped her mother and simply wanted to write about it (but not very well). I was happy to cast it aside, which is apparently what the editor did also.....

[Amy · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book as a reflection on how we become who were are through our mothers. One of my favorite quotes, "To create something meaningful as an adult is all the more precious because you know how ephemeral life is, how painful and difficult and even ugly it can be." It is really good.

[Gina · Rating 5 out of 5]

A well-written and enjoyable account of a woman and her relationship with her mother. There are ups and there are downs, and the author doesn't sugar-coat the past. There is a sentiment tone, but it never overshadows the quality of the work.

[Hannah · Rating 2 out of 5]

I appreciate the concept of writing a glowing memoir about your idealized mother -- but it should probably be kept just for family. Writing style aside (simplistic) I thought this book was overly sentimental and only parts of it were truly interesting.

[Lisa Galet klug · Rating 5 out of 5]

I want to write stories for my daughters. I'm glad my mom, my Granny, and my Aunt Fredukah told me so many stories about their lives that I can pass forward and share: this book is the inspiration to keep telling those stories. I think I've now read it three times.

[Lily Koppel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Poignant, painterly.

[Julie · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this book, too. Valerie Steiker is one of those amazing writers who happens to be a brilliant editor, too.

[Theresa F. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Did I like it? Yes.
Would I reread it? Probably not.
Would I recommend it? Not sure.

[Barbara · Rating 3 out of 5]

Glad I read it, but not sure I'd go out of my way to read it again.