Four Mothers

A Year in Motherhood Around the World

De: Abigail Leonard

"A gripping, vital, and utterly compelling book"
Elinor Cleghorn, author of Unwell Women

"The exquisitely reported and intensely readable story of how women from four corners of the world navigate early parenthood ... Once I started Four Mothers I could not put it down"
Darcy Lockman, author of All the Rage

As the year turns, four women give birth.

In Japan, Tsukasa's government-funded hospital room overlooks the mountains and she spends seven days there, before resting at her mother's house for a month. The day after giving birth in Kenya, Chelsea returns to her flat in the city, far from her extended family, and her friends help her settle in. Anna, who has already been on maternity leave in Finland for a month, delivers her baby in a midwife-lead birth centre, a tradition dating back a century. In America, despite her insurance, Sarah pays $3,000 from her savings for an uncomplicated birth, before heading home, excited and overwhelmed.

Four Mothers follows these women over the next twelve months, through their first year of parenting. Each finds wonder and delight in her baby, but each also struggles with the realities of motherhood, personal relationships bumping up against social challenges. Through immersive storytelling and deep reporting, Abigail Leonard brings to life the policies that shape the experiences of both parents and children: access to healthcare and parental leave, community and workplace support. Both intimate and international, we see what is and what could be.

"This is real motherhood on the page, bolstered by rigorous research to explain why our current systems have failed families and offer insights for a brighter future"
Jo Piazza, author of How to Be Married

©2025 Abigail Leonard (P)2025 Hodder & Stoughton Limited

Reseñas de la Crítica

'Four Mothers shows how trials of modern parenting are complicated by so much more than gender norms, familial expectations, or individual finances. This deeply personal look at women worldwide grappling with the best and worst moments of their first year is eye-opening and cathartic. It is a love letter to parents and a clarion call for better policy' (Eve Rodsky, author of Fair Play)

'I could not put this book down. Four Mothers is a masterfully reported work of narrative nonfiction, tracing the journeys of four remarkable women. Abigail Leonard deftly weaves together these astonishing stories of heartbreak, hope, sacrifice, and love. Grounded in deep research and reporting, she skillfully reveals the hidden forces and systems that shape modern motherhood. This book will make you step back and consider your own experiences of mothering and being mothered, how similar or different it all may have been in another place, at another time, in another body' (Erika Hayasaki, author of Somewhere Sisters)