Reviews - The School for Good Mothers

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9.62k reviews for:

The School for Good Mothers

Jessamine Chan

3.7 AVERAGE

mdahg's review against another edition

2.0

challenging dark emotional sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: Complicated

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Devastating.

cici_chen's review against another edition

4.0

It’s more of a 4.5 I think. I really loved this book and a lot of the feelings of being Asian in North America rang true to me so I was crying like a little baby in the last 50 pages. I suppose the drawback with dystopian for me is that some of the behaviour was beyond understanding. Especially since this seems to be a near future dystopian novel which I think would need to make a little more sense to me for it to reach the full five stars. Since it is so similar to reality, the people working at the school did seem heartless to an extreme degree. It has the same vibes as the people working at the institute in the institute by Stephen King. Additionally, the need for perfection also rings somewhat hallow as It didn’t make sense to me that if her ex and his girlfriend both want Frida back in their lives and she has shown great improvement in the program, why would they not give even visitation rights? With this criteria, it would honestly shock me that any of the mothers got custody of their child back. Given these drawbacks, I still felt that the relationships established and the reactions from the mothers were realistic and thought provoking and I liked the intersectionality of race, gender, class and motherhood. I wished that she did a little more with the fact that these little robot doll children felt and thought like real children and yet were basically being tortured for no one’s benefit. They were clearly developing personalities and attachments and emotions even if they were robots and I wish that there was just a little more closure. I guess what I really wish was for the state to get some form of repercussion or even the slight sense that they understand what they did was wrong to the mothers, the families, the children and the robot children.

Anyways, I guess I feel kind of conflicted about the premise as well as the end (though I do lean towards liking it but I wish there was a bit more of a set up for that because it was a tad rushed) but the way I weeped has me ranking it as a low 5 rather than a high 4.

Edit: upon reflection (and now that it’s not 3 in the morning) it’s more of a four stars because of just how cartoonishly bad the government is. I am not pro government and of course the courts are not just but the injustice in this book was very extreme to the point of unbelievability. But I do like the clear writing and it’s a pretty good debut book.

Edit: i am still thinking about it after all this time so it’s definitely 4 stars but I guess the ending was pretty weird. It was like it took a turn from dystopian to psychological thriller vibes which is kinda strange.

ckopietz's review against another edition

4.0

The School for Good Mothers begins as a fairly straightforward exploration of responsibility and expectations of motherhood and eventually becomes more dystopian as the narrative moves on. "The School" Frida finds herself at — after her very bad day in which she makes a mistake that endangers the safety of her daughter — is a Big Brother-like prison in which she and other mothers are meant to learn how to become not only good mothers but perfect mothers while being constantly surveilled and goalposts constantly moving. The offences committed by the mothers that find themselves there range from innocuous to violent, yet the curriculum is the same and the expectations they are to meet are often impossible by even the most devoted parents. Following Frida's perspective throughout is powerful and you feel her frustration and bouts of hopelessness. Somewhat slow to build, but a cleverly developed narrative.

a_lyttle_book_blog's review against another edition

4.0

challenging dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

This book was so hard to read and hurt my soul. I hated every second of this book but I couldn't put it down.

alexandrathgr8's review against another edition

4.0

The overall concept of this book is great, it’s a very good dystopian novel. It was uncomfortable in the very best ways, but it was lacking a bit of plot progression for me. I felt there were some missed opportunities but overall, absolutely a good read. I’ll be thinking about it for quite a while.

quickredfox's review against another edition

4.5

challenging dark emotional sad tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Character

Strong character development: Complicated

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

madlawalsh's review against another edition

3.0

3.25⭐️
I really wasn’t sure how she was going to end the book but I never would have guessed or wanted it to be like this. Dropped the rating a full star.