Book review: And Baby Makes More – edited by Susan Goldberg and Chloe Brushwood Rose

In these times of rising equality, queer families are coming out into the open, bringing their queerness into our courts, schools and even supermarkets.  But what is a queer family?  If we see them in the media they are usually two mums or Elton John, yet we know our community is more diverse than that.  This book attempts to address the invisibility of today’s queer family.

And Baby Makes More is a book of short stories.  All are about creating babies in queer families and all the families represented are wildly diverse.  There are lesbians who intentionally chose a donor dad and lesbians who accidently created a donor dad, the donors themselves, trans and genderqueer family members, gay men, single mothers and polyamorous parents.  The issues explored are, what makes a parent, the importance of biology, decision making, grandparents, methods of creation, societal expectations and so on.  There is even a comic book entry.

The stories were edited by two women who are both lesbian mothers themselves, with their stories included in the book.   It would have been easy for them to create a book solely on the joys of motherhood, but they didn’t.  They also included stories of failure, of fears, and of family situations gone wrong.  In amongst the thought-provoking stories there are also some genuinely funny moments.  This would be a great read for anyone wishing to start their own queer family.

Review by Ida Raine