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There are currently 27 member reviews
for Glitter and Glue
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Sue J. (Wauwatosa, WI)
mothers and daughters
This memoir explores the relationship between a mother and daughter and how it evolves over time. Kelly Corrigan's mother described the family dynamic as "Your father's the glitter but I'm the glue." After college, Kelly takes off with a friend to see the world and become interesting. While visiting Australia, her savings runs low and she takes a job as a live-in nanny for a recently widowed father of two. While trying to fit into the family, she hears her mother's voice everywhere giving advice. Corrigan has a great sense of humor, she's able to describe her situation in a very frank way. I enjoyed this memoir not only because it helped me reflect on the relationship I had with my mother, but also the relationship I have with my adult daughter.
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Karen J. (Bremerton, WA)
Wanted More Depth
Fans of Kelly Corrigan will enjoy this touching memoir of her first foray from her childhood home wherein she travels to Australia to live adventurously and experience interesting things, free of the constraints of her strained relationship with her mother. However, soon her funds dwindle and Kelly, needing a job, takes a position as a nanny to a newly widowed father's young children. It is through parenting these two maternal orphans that Kelly begins to gain insight into her stoic and emotionally distant mother. An easy quick read and good material for a book club. However, I only gave it four stars as it did not plumb deep enough for me.
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Kathy S. (Danbury, CT)
Needs More Glue
I was expecting a much different book, with more stories about Kelly's relationship with her mother and how it had changed over the years. Her experience as a nanny in Australia dominated the book, and then when she returned to the States, Kelly is home only a short period of time before moving across the country to California. It is here that she falls in love, marries and raises her family. Although she claims she emulates her mother more and more as she embraces her own motherhood, there is not enough back story to support this. Fast read, enjoyable, could have been so much better.
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Carolyn S. (Decatur, GA)
Homage to Motherhood
While acting as a nanny to a bereaved family in Australia, Kelly Corrigan recalls the many things her own Mother would have said and done in different situations that she faces in Glitter and Glue. The novel has a weak storyline and seems more like an essay about paying homage to motherhood.
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Priscilla M. (Houston, TX)
A little more glue, perhaps?
There isn't a woman alive who does not have stories to tell about her relationship with her mother. I was prepared to sympathize with the author as she discovered through life experiences just how much of her mother she had internalized without knowing it. I know I have been amazed at the number of times I have opened my mouth to say something and out popped my mother.
The author, Kelly Corrigan, goes on an extended trip to Australia and finds herself needing a job to make ends meet. She takes a job as a nanny, and in the process of caring for three motherless children, finds herself relating more and more to the mother with whom she thought she had nothing in common. It was a an easy read, and I did enjoy it, but I found myself looking for a little more internal conflict along the way. I felt like the full realization of her relationship to her mother did not occur until she herself was a mother, much later after her time in Australia.
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Gunta K. (Glens Falls, NY)
Stating the obvious
I did not fall in love with Kelly Corrigan's memoir. Her intense and clearly meant to be amusing criticisms of her mother and her parenting skills are unfair and show Kelly's immaturity. leaving the country to backpack overseas to experience "life" is irresponsible as her parents have invested in Kelly's college education and want the best for her. So the "best" turns out to be a job as a nanny in Australia. The one thing this job does do is created the realization in Kelly that she misses her family and needs her mother. This kind of blow by blow description of one's growing up may be quite satisfactory to the individual's immediate family but does nothing for anyone else. Once Kelly became quite ill she understood that the only person on this planet who could help her walk through this disaster was her mom.
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