After a successful foray as a novelist (2006’s The Sweet Potato Queens’ First Big-Ass Novel
), Brown returns to instructional mode with this frothy and ribald guide to parenting (“the most incredibly full-time volunteer job ever”). Beginning with the physical changes during pregnancy, she notes the joy of gaining “big, voluptuous, cleaving breasts” until realizing that “most everything south of them grows exponentially at the same time.” There’s even advice on talking to a pregnant woman (“a crapshoot on a good day”). But fairly quickly, the baby is out and hungry (“Breast-feeding was just about the greatest job I ever had,” Browne confesses, recalling her daughter “latched on to me like my own little refrigerator magnet”). At that point, there’s a division between Alpha Moms (“who make their own dirt from scratch”) and Beta Moms (“the one that Alpha Moms trust only to bring the paper towels and trash bags to the parties”). Like a sassy best girlfriend, Browne offers her (and her fellow Queens’) brassy take on teaching tykes values and manners with an irreverent way of dealing with cussing and kids trying to bilk the Tooth Fairy out of $100. (Jan. 1)
