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jess_mango's review against another edition
4.0
I read "Why the Caged Bird Sings" YEARS ago and really enjoyed it so was happy to see this short follow-up memoir by Angelou available in audio on the Libby App. It was a pretty short book and focused on Angelou's relationship with her mother. While I didn't find this as strong as "caged bird" I am glad that I read and I can see the love and respect that Maya has for her mother.
applegnreads's review
3.0
Written more in the style of a series of vignettes about her and her mother's relationship. Has some interesting moments.
pbraue13's review
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
sad
tense
fast-paced
4.0
africanbookaddict's review
5.0
http://africanbookaddict.wordpress.com/2014/09/08/mom-me-mom-by-maya-angelou/
Maya Angelou never disappoints me with her writing. Even though this book had a lot of repeated incidences from 'I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings', this is a wonderful autobiography centered around Maya Angelou and her mother, Vivian Baxter. A mother's love is indeed a powerful thing. Maya's mother's love certainly made Maya Angelou into the phenomenal woman she was. The important lessons Maya's mother taught her, as well as Maya's source of direction and life are portrayed in this book. Vivian Baxter was not a perfect woman but she was definitely a strong, stern, hip, loving, jovial mother to her children. I loved reading about all the ups and downs Maya and her mother faced in their lives. Vivian Baxter was surely blessed with a daughter with impeccable memory, for Maya Angelou painted her mother in a light that all mothers should try and emulate.
Maya Angelou never disappoints me with her writing. Even though this book had a lot of repeated incidences from 'I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings', this is a wonderful autobiography centered around Maya Angelou and her mother, Vivian Baxter. A mother's love is indeed a powerful thing. Maya's mother's love certainly made Maya Angelou into the phenomenal woman she was. The important lessons Maya's mother taught her, as well as Maya's source of direction and life are portrayed in this book. Vivian Baxter was not a perfect woman but she was definitely a strong, stern, hip, loving, jovial mother to her children. I loved reading about all the ups and downs Maya and her mother faced in their lives. Vivian Baxter was surely blessed with a daughter with impeccable memory, for Maya Angelou painted her mother in a light that all mothers should try and emulate.
jessicajane's review against another edition
3.0
Maya Angelou’s autobiography, vol. 7
This book differs from Angelou’s other memoirs, focusing on her relationship with her mother throughout her life. It is split into two parts: ‘Mom & Me’ recounts Angelou’s childhood up until becoming a mother herself at the age of 17; ‘Me & Mom’ then looks at how things changed when her mother became grandmother to her son. Vivian Baxter is portrayed as such a wonderful woman that I wish I could have met her, but Maya Angelou does not pretend things were always easy between them. Her account is nuanced and demonstrates the realities of human relationship.
I expected this to be primarily a book of reflections and was somewhat disappointed. The bulk of the writing is simply a retelling of stories told in her previous books, but with her mother as a more central character. The more reflective passages are stunning, but the rest is a less detailed replication of what we’ve read before.
A brilliant standalone book, less exciting at the end of a series.
This book differs from Angelou’s other memoirs, focusing on her relationship with her mother throughout her life. It is split into two parts: ‘Mom & Me’ recounts Angelou’s childhood up until becoming a mother herself at the age of 17; ‘Me & Mom’ then looks at how things changed when her mother became grandmother to her son. Vivian Baxter is portrayed as such a wonderful woman that I wish I could have met her, but Maya Angelou does not pretend things were always easy between them. Her account is nuanced and demonstrates the realities of human relationship.
I expected this to be primarily a book of reflections and was somewhat disappointed. The bulk of the writing is simply a retelling of stories told in her previous books, but with her mother as a more central character. The more reflective passages are stunning, but the rest is a less detailed replication of what we’ve read before.
A brilliant standalone book, less exciting at the end of a series.
gabmc's review against another edition
5.0
I listened to the audio book which was narrated by Maya Angelou. To hear this amazing author read her own words in her own way was amazing. Maya Angelou was an extraordinary woman - poet, playwright, professor, mother, daughter, civil rights activist ... just to name a few of her roles. In this book which I think was her last, she talks about her relationship with her mother. When Angelou was only three years old and her brother Bailey, five, they were sent by their mother to live with their paternal grandparents, in the book she says "you were a terrible mother of small children, but there has never been anyone greater than you as a mother of a young adult". At age 13, Angelou and Bailey returned to California to live with their mother, Vivian Baxter. At first she called her "Lady" because "you are beautiful and you don't look like a mother". When Vivian needed to talk to her children about something serious, she would say "Please sit down, I have something to say". In this way she educated her children about love, courage, strength and the difference between right and wrong. Maya Angelou says "My mother's gifts of courage to me were both large and small. I met loves and lost loves. I dared to travel to Africa to allow my son to finish high school in Cairo. I lived with a South African freedom fighter whom I met when he was at the United Nations petitioning for an end to apartheid." This was a remarkable book detailing the lives of the relationship between two remarkable women - it is something I will come back to again and again.
ovenbird_reads's review
4.0
I'm not entirely sure how I feel about this book. The writing style is unusually simple. No flowery language, just direct and stark presentation of the facts. I felt almost assaulted by the narrative sometimes--like having heavy rocks dropped on your feet.
The relationship between Maya Angelou and her mother is powerful and beautifully imperfect. Here is a book for all mothers to read--a story that shows you that being a theoretically good mother doesn't mean being the best one in reality. Angelou's gun-toting, headstrong mother abandoned her two children to their grandmother for the duration of their childhoods, only reclaiming them as they approached adolescence. Yet she is not apologetic. She claims with confidence that she did the best she could, did what she thought was the right thing. While Vivien Baxter is a deeply flawed and tempestuous woman, she has something to teach about the tenacity of love. This is a love story always on the brink of eruption. The relationship portrayed is volcanic, slightly unsettling, yet obviously transformative for the writer.
I think I need some time to let this settle. It's a jarring read, with moments of true violence and moments more subtly destructive but always moving towards resolution steeped in the primal love and unfaltering dedication of a mother who appears larger than life.
The relationship between Maya Angelou and her mother is powerful and beautifully imperfect. Here is a book for all mothers to read--a story that shows you that being a theoretically good mother doesn't mean being the best one in reality. Angelou's gun-toting, headstrong mother abandoned her two children to their grandmother for the duration of their childhoods, only reclaiming them as they approached adolescence. Yet she is not apologetic. She claims with confidence that she did the best she could, did what she thought was the right thing. While Vivien Baxter is a deeply flawed and tempestuous woman, she has something to teach about the tenacity of love. This is a love story always on the brink of eruption. The relationship portrayed is volcanic, slightly unsettling, yet obviously transformative for the writer.
I think I need some time to let this settle. It's a jarring read, with moments of true violence and moments more subtly destructive but always moving towards resolution steeped in the primal love and unfaltering dedication of a mother who appears larger than life.