A ferociously honest and disarmingly funny memoir about an elusive mother’s encroaching dementia and a reckoning with a complicated childhood.

A brutally funny mother-daughter memoir that asks the question, How can you lose something you never had? Molly Jong-Fast is the only child of Erica Jong, author of the feminist autobiographical novel Fear of Flying. A sensational exploration of female sexual desire, it catapulted Erica into the heady world of fame in the early 1970s. Molly grew up with her mother everywhere - on television, in the crossword puzzle, in the newspaper. But rarely at home. How to Lose Your Mother is Molly's delicious and despairing memoir about an intense mother-daughter relationship, a sometimes chaotic upbringing with a fame-hungry parent, and how that can really mess you up. But with her mother's heartbreaking descent into dementia, and Molly's realization that she is going to lose this remarkable woman, it is also a story of love, of loss, of confusion and of deep grief. Honest, moving, sharp and funny, How to Lose Your Mother takes us behind the scenes of a fascinating and sometimes tumultuous family dynamic, revels in the gossipy details of Erica's famous friends and enemies, and leaves us with a better understanding of our own most precious relationships.

Details

ISBN13: 9781035029341
Format: Paperback / softback
Number of Pages: 256
Edition:
Publication Date:
Publisher: Pan Macmillan
Publication City, Country: London, United Kingdom
Dimensions (cm): 23.4(H)x15.3(L)x2.1(W)322
Weight (gm): 322

Author Biography

Molly Jong-Fast is the author of three books, a special correspondent for Vanity Fair and host of the Fast Politics podcast.

Reviews

A gripping memoir about mothers and daughters, husbands and wives, loss and healing, and what it means to finally accept your past and become an adult. Despite being raised in the shadow of fame, Molly's story is both uniquely specific and utterly, exquisitely relatable. -- Lori Gottlieb, author of Maybe You Should Talk to Someone
Brisk and funny and beautifully done * The Times *
Punchy . . . with moments of deep sadness leavened by a sardonic humour * The Guardian *
Molly Jong-Fast is the embodiment of Erica Jong's legacy, and this book is a brave, if sometimes troubling, testament to her own capacity for survival * The Observer *
By turns hilarious and heartbreaking. -- Oprah Daily, The most anticipated books of 2025
Often rancorous, sometimes furious, never self-indulgent . . . there's also love in this book. The imperfect, painful, and maddening kind that so many readers will undoubtedly be able to relate to. * The Financial Times *
Mesmerizing, intimate, wise, unputdownable, crazily honest, heartbreaking, funny, illuminating – Beautiful and painful at the same time, just like real life. -- Anne Lamott, author of Bird by Bird
Unsparing . . . a score-settling marathon at times, but also a loving elegy. * The New York Times *
A riveting reckoning on the challenging ties many have to their parents . . . Both heartbreaking and humorous. * New York Observer *
Conveys the mess, terror, loneliness and glory of familial love, in all its riveting complexity. -- Claire Messud, author of This Strange Eventful History
In the tradition of the finest memoir writing, the author spares no one, herself least of all, as she untangles the bad from the good while still allowing for some tricky knots. * The Los Angeles Times *
Resisting tidy sentiment or easy answers, Jong-Fast dives headfirst into the often-difficult ambiguities of parent-child bonds. The results are stunning. * Publishers Weekly *
Manages to leaven the pain with self-deprecating humour and a mighty reservoir of love . . . . . . arming us all with lines so good you won't just want to underline them, you will want to cut them out to share. * The Washington Post *
The best book Jong-Fast could have written about the worst year of her life. * Kirkus *
This raw, intimate memoir is a stunning portrait of difficult relationships and how we survive them. * People *
Honest, emotional and at times funny. -- Katty Kay * bbc.co.uk *
Molly Jong-Fast is the embodiment of Erica Jong’s legacy, and this book is a brave, if sometimes troubling, testament to her own capacity for survival. * The Observer *