Slummy Mummy by Fiona Neill

From the Publisher

A smart, laugh-out-loud debut novel about a deeply flawed but endearing stay-at-home mom, a book for anyone who took Bridget Jones to heart a decade ago-and now has kids.

Lucy Sweeney has three sons, a husband on a short fuse, and a tendency toward domestic disaster. It has been years since the dirty laundry pile was less than three feet high, months since she remembered to have sex, and weeks since her toddler started using the trash can as a toilet. Lucy is living in a constant state of emergency, caught between perfectionist Yummy Mummy No. 1 and competitive Alpha Mum, making it hard for her to remember exactly why she exchanged her career and sanity for less than blissful domesticity. When she begins a flirtation with Sexy Domesticated Dad, a father from the school car-pool lane, the string of white lies to cover up the trail of chaos and illicit desire starts to unravel and disaster looms.

Slummy Mummy: The Secret Life of Lucy Sweeney is a hilarious novel about the dilemmas of modern marriage and motherhood for those who never discovered their inner domestic goddess. Pitch-perfect and satisfyingly smart, it does for the stay-at-home mother what Allison Pearson's blockbuster bestseller I Don't Know How She Does It did for the working mom: It offers a lovable, flawed character who resonates, entertains, and undoubtedly has it worse than you do.

Washington Post

Neill bucks the chick-lit trend with prose that's clever and endearing, and frazzled parents will love the way she nails the sticky, hair-pulling mania of domestic life.

Times (London)

Several cuts above the rest...witty, observant and supremely intelligent.

Boston Globe

A deftly executed domestic comedy.

Vogue - Anna Wintour

Plays with the chaos and comedy of 30-something metropolitan maternity and brings it to an unexpectedly moving conclusion.

Publishers Weekly

Neill's humorous novel about a hopelessly disorganized mother constantly getting herself into scrapes would have benefited from abridgment. While talented narrator Kellgren ably conveys Lucy's likability and expertly creates distinctive voices for the other characters, the novel's many similar incidents blur. Lucy constantly finds herself in embarrassingly public situations (her toddler son pees on the leg of a famous actor; she uses a credit card she's reported lost and must deal with the police; she ducks down in her car to avoid being seen by someone and a crowd gathers to find out who abandoned their children in a car). After a while, the repetitive incidents become predictable, and the audiobook's pace becomes tedious. Only on the final disc does the story pick up again, with a hilariously farcical climax that throws all the characters and subplots together. The characters are likable and the story is amusing, but judicious abridging would have made for a brisker, funnier listen. Simultaneous release with the Riverhead hardcover (Reviews, April 23). (July)

Kirkus Reviews

Bored North London housewife uses flirtation and alcohol to liven things up, in U.K. journalist Neill's debut. Lucy Sweeney is in a rut. Staying home to care for her three young boys has all but sucked the life out of the once-creative television producer. To keep things interesting, Lucy maintains a constant level of chaos in her home. School projects are slapped together at the last moment, laundry piles up for months and pet hamsters run wild. In addition to horrid housekeeping skills, Lucy also maintains £10,000 of credit card debt and has a tenuous relationship with her oft-traveling husband. Rather than set her life in order, Lucy gets overly involved in school politics to battle the monotony of school runs and soiled nappies. Playground politics offer Lucy plenty of opportunity to land herself in more trouble. She harbors two crushes: one on a man referred to as "Sexy Domesticated Dad" and the other on the impeccably dressed and impossibly slim mother of four (aka Yummy Mummy No. 1). The girl-crush is relatively harmless; Lucy is jealous of Yummy Mummy's ability to be prompt and properly accessorized at all times. As far as the Sexy Domesticated Dad, her interest is potentially hazardous and purely sexual. SDD reciprocates her feelings, and an affair becomes a very real possibility. Things in Lucy's world are ready to implode as she endures a classic midlife crisis. In an effort to maintain her sanity and connection to the "real" world, Lucy sneaks off for drinks with her single girlfriends. But her single pals only serve to further complicate Lucy's messy affairs. She can't resist meddling in the love lives of others. Neill is a sound writer adroitly producing spot-on dialog and afew hilarious moments of Mummy-mayhem. But while she attempts fresh twists, readers will eventually suffer from disappointment by the too-familiar plot. From the maternal self-doubt to the spoiled supporting characters, everything feels mass-manufactured.

What People Are Saying

Lauren Fox
What's thrilling about Slummy Mummy is as much the sparkling wit on every page as Fiona Neill's sometimes sad, often funny, always unflinching insight into the underbelly of marriage and family life. Neill pulls no punches, but she brings home her point with such grace and humor, you won't feel the sting. (Lauren Fox, author of Still Life with Husband )

Karen Quinn
Smart, funny, and well-observed, Slummy Mummy is a must read for any woman who loves to laugh at the often unintentional humor in domestic life. (Karen Quinn, author of Wife in the Fast Lane and The Ivy Chronicles )

Anna Wintour
Hilarious . . . a literary phenomenon to rival Helen Fielding's Bridge Jones's Diary and Allison Pearson's I Don't Know How She Does It . . . [Neill] plays with the chaos and comedy of 30-something metropolitan maternity and brings it to an unexpectedly moving conclusion. (Anna Wintour, Vogue )

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