cover image How to Mother a Successful Daughter: A Practical Guide to Empowering Girls from Birth to Eighteen

How to Mother a Successful Daughter: A Practical Guide to Empowering Girls from Birth to Eighteen

Nicky Marone. Harmony, $25 (304pp) ISBN 978-0-517-70488-2

In addressing the question of how mothers can help their daughters shape successful futures, lecturer and workshop leader Marone (How to Father a Successful Daughter) draws heavily from recent research indicating that girls' self-esteem tends to plummet during adolescence. Happily, she takes the topic a step further, discussing what mothers can do to counteract the many cultural messages that belittle girls. Her premise--that mothers can be positive role models by exhibiting and helping their daughters to develop mastery skills--is sound, and her definition of ""success"" is flexible and undogmatic, based upon individual goals. She urges mothers to examine their own traits of ""learned helplessness"" and to set about becoming positive role model/mentors. While much of Marone's advice is savvy and useful, some suggestions may require special sensitivity to a child's current attachments, e.g., criticizing Barbie or poking fun at the romance novels that may absorb an adolescent. Still, many of her ideas, such as encouraging girls in math and science, learning new skills together such as in-line skating or playing backgammon, and keeping fathers involved in girls' lives, though not new, will be useful for mothers grappling with the problems of raising girls in today's world. (Apr.)