Silence Is a Scary Sound: And Other Stories on Living Through the Terrible Twos and Threes

Edwards (I’m Sorry... Love, Your Husband), creator of the parenting blog No Idea What I’m Doing, reports from the front lines of parenthood in this engaging and often hilarious collection of essays. Parents of children of all ages will appreciate (or shudder at) Edwards’s tales of the years when a baby becomes mobile and life as one knew it implodes. Preschoolers, he informs the childless, can summon bedlam in ways no adult can imagine: creating a ketchupy homemade slip-and-slide on the kitchen floor, dancing in the soda spray from a shaken can, or puking into a parent’s mouth. Intertwined with the comical tales of toddler-induced chaos are moments of fear and helplessness, like the time two-year-old Norah locked herself in her bedroom. As the hours passed and the tears increased, and with the locksmith a no-show, Edwards’s resolve hardened: embarrassment be damned, he and his wife had better call 911. As Edwards found through his blog, many dads had comparably mortifying story to share. Edwards’s observations—both tender musings on his struggles to be a good father, and dyspeptic grousing on lousy Father’s Day gifts—will find fans in anyone who has ever tangled with a poopy diaper and lost. (Nov.)