I absolutely adore Ward's novels, but I admit I struggled with this collection--especially in the first half, where both tone and theme feel overly repetitive, the focus placed so much on pregnancy/getting pregnant as it is. In fact, that's a theme throughout the whole of the collection, far more so than motherhood, and I might not have picked up the collection if that had been made more clear on the cover copy. Still, I did finish the work, and there are some stand-out stories. "The Way the Sky Changed" is especially powerful, and there's also a lot to admire in the linked stories making up the second half of the collection. That said, I'm not sure I'd pick up another collection by Ward. Her prose brings characters to life beautifully, but the depth she brings to novels adds more than slice-of-life, she brings so much depth to even the simplest stories, and that depth just didn't translate into her short stories. Perhaps part of that is how repetitive the tone and themes felt from story to story, but as it stands, I just didn't enjoy this collection all that much.

If you want to give Ward a try, pick up one of her novels and it might well make you a fan of her for life, but unless you specifically want pregnancy-themed women's fiction short stories that all strike loosely the same note, I have to recommend leaving this collection on the shelf, lovely as Ward's prose may be. ( )

A collection of 12 short stories about love, marriage and motherhood. Six are unrelated, and the other six revolved around Lola and her family. ( )

Beautiful; absolutely heart breaking. ( )

Beautiful; absolutely heart breaking. ( )

I love Ward's novels. Her story collection not so much. I really wish I could say I liked this book because I'm a huge fan of the author's other work but these stories are all a little vacant feeling. ( )