THE MOTHER OF ALL THINGS

What is the cure for misogyny?

Weaving together contemporary and ancient storylines, Landau addresses a question often asked by women, hardly ever by men: Where did all our power go? Ava Zaretsky, an art historian and mother of two, juggles her life and ambitions along with her primary responsibility for the domestic and parental chores of her marriage. Her husband Kasper’s career as a movie producer requires him to work long hours and travel. Family obligations don’t seem to get in the way of work for him (or even occupy the same amount of brain space they do for Ava). When Kasper relocates from California to Bulgaria for a six-month shoot, Ava examines all aspects of their relationship with a critical eye but travels there for a summertime visit with her kids in an effort to keep the family intact. An encounter in Sofia with a feminist college professor who’d been influential in Ava’s education and thought process results in Ava’s growing involvement with a group of women seeking to reclaim long-lost power and status through the re-creation of ancient goddess rites and practices. Interspersed throughout Ava’s story are episodes from the life of a Greek mother and her teenage daughter (who was on the cusp of marriage) that have parallels to the contemporary narrative. (Ava’s own daughter is edging toward adolescence, and Ava’s concerns about preparing her for the fraught life of a woman weigh heavily on her.) Landau launches the novel with a prologue that foreshadows the extent of the rage carried by the women participating in the rituals, a culmination of centuries of repression and disempowerment. Ava’s tightrope walk between competing obligations is vividly illustrated in a thoughtful novel utilizing the past to illuminate present-day ills.

An enraging past is the prologue to a provocative present-day narrative.