The Complete Book of Mothers-in-Law

A Celebration

Luisa Dillner

• Publisher: Faber & Faber
• eBook ISBN:
  9780571248216
• Year: 2008

Most of us either have a mother-in-law or will be one, and it's not a role most women take on gladly. Mothers-in-law are traditionally the butt of jokes, declared to be nasty, possessive and interfering - but are they really as bad as this reputation suggests? Luisa Dillner looks beyond the stereotype of the mother-in-law and finds they come in many different varieties, from loveable and loyal to lonely, ferocious and scheming. She traces their history, from Ancient Greece and Rome to modern times, through fairy tales and traditions, in this celebration of this most complicated of relationships.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Dedication
• Table of Contents
• Prologue: My Mother-in-law Maggie
• Chapter One: Mothers-in-law: an Essential History
• Chapter Two: Mothers-in-law in Different Cultures
• Chapter Three: Motherly Mothers-in-law
• Chapter Four: Royal and Presidential Mothers-in-law
• Chapter Five: Mixed Feelings about Mothers-in-law
• Chapter Six: Mothers-in-law who Took a Stand
• Chapter Seven: Mad, Bad and Scheming Mothers-in-law
• Chapter Eight: Fairy-tale Mothers-in-law
• Chapter Nine: Mother-in-law-Baiting
• Chapter Ten: Racy Mothers-in-law
• Chapter Eleven: Mothers-in-law on the Web
• Chapter Twelve: How to be a Good Mother-in-Law
• Acknowledgements
• About the Author
• In the Same Series
• Copyright