Fathers' Race

Charles Jennings

Books about fatherhood are usually either chipper no-nonsense handbooks dense with cartoons and practical advice; or collections of essays maudlin introspective and bowling under the weight of their own sensitivity. FATHER'S RACE is neither of these. Deliberately unhelpful almost entirely free of useful generalisations and shamelessly frank about the realities of fatherhood from conception to ten years it plunges into the whole sordid business of nappies boredom family excursions to preserved warships madness food toys sex education clothes that don't fit bonding vomit love hitting financial ruin happiness and of course nursery-school fathers' races where Charles Jennings finds himself overtaken by the whole field and a grandfather - but is rescued from humiliation by his own son aged five ... This is what it's really like: a mess a shambles of experiences and emotions a universe in which failure and triumph occupy almost the same space at the same time; as do love and rage; misery and elation; boredom and breathless terror. Read this book and at least you'll know that it's not just you. Fatherhood is actually meant to be impossible.