These are some books that informed my recent artwork for Postpartum Paintings and continue to inspire me. I have included them in reverse order of when I read them, as far as I can remember. I spent a lot of time researching books related to pregnancy, birth, postpartum, and motherhood, so I thought this might be helpful to anyone else curious about these topics. 

*Warning: I’ve included a asterisk for books that contain intense, scary, or sad birth or postpartum experiences. If you are extra sensitive or pregnant, you may want to skip these ones. 

Suggested Reading List

Mothers & Other Monsters by Maureen McHugh*

Kid Gloves: Nine Months of Careful Chaos by Lucy Knisley*

Babel by R.F. Kuang

Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow by Gabrielle Zevin

Pineapple Street by Jenny Jackson

Witches by Brenda Lozano, translated by Heather Cleary

Linea Nigra: An Essay on Pregnancy and Earthquakes by Jazmina Barrera, translated by Christina MacSweeney 

The Kingdom of Ordinary Time: Poems by Marie Howe

No One is Talking About This by Patricia Lockwood* 

Bringing Up Bebe by Pamela Druckerman

Nightbitch by Rachel Yoder* 

Violeta by Isabel Allende, translated by Frances Riddle* 

The Candy House by Jennifer Egan

How to Do Nothing: Resisting the Attention Economy by Jenny Odell

The Motherly Guide to Becoming Mama by Jill Koziol, Li Tenety, and Diana Spalding

Olga Dies Dreaming by Xochitl Gonzalez

Designing Your Perfect Nursery: A Step-by-Step Approach to Creating the Nursery of Your  Dreams by Naomi Coe

Expecting Better: Why the Conventional Pregnancy Wisdom is Wrong - and What You Really Need to Know by Emily Oster

This Long Thread: Women of Color on Craft, Community, and Connection by Jen Hewett

What it Means when a Man Falls from the Sky by Lesley Nneka Arimah

Woman on the Edge of Time by Marge Piercy

Amulet by Roberto Bolaño, translated by Chris Andrews

Faces in the Crowd by Valeria Luiselli, translated by Christina MacSweeney

Stories of Your Life and Others by Ted Chiang*

Revolutionary Motoring: Love on the Front Lines by Alexis Pauline Gumbs, China Martens and Mai’a Williams

Books I have been meaning to finish or start — I don’t yet know which may need warnings so beware.

Mother Brain: How Neuroscience is Rewriting the Story of Parenthood by Chelsea Conaboy

The Fourth Trimester by Kimberly Ann Johnson

Designing Motherhood: Things that Make and Break Our Births by Michelle Millar Fisher and Amber Winick

Things that Helped by Jessica Friedmann

Mother is a Verb: A Conventional History by Sarah Knott

Like a Mother: A Feminist Journey Through the Science and Culture of Pregnancy by

Angela Garbes

Essential Labor: Mothering as Social Change by Angela Garbes