Mothers: A Celebration

Stoddard's perspective on family is highly idealized: there are no teen pregnancies, no drug addiction, no abused or rebellious children, no delinquent child-support payments. Her milieu is affluent and so mannerly it's boring to read about. Interspersing quotations from Plato, Mother Teresa and the like, Stoddard recalls her occasionally difficult relations with her mother, praises her mother-in-law as an ideal mom and devotes considerable attention to her own self-attributed mothering skills, with two adult daughters supplying verifying testimony. In raising her children, Stoddard (Creating a Beautiful Home) learned to ""flow into each situation with a loving heart,'' for mothers, she notes, are not charged with ""making over"" their children but with ""letting their divine light shine through.'' The former New York decorator has a large following for her self-help and style books, so this one might also appeal to the tony set. Author tour. (May)