The Other Mother

For Kelly, meeting the right guy was pretty straightforward – becoming a ‘spare mum’ to his two sons was more daunting. It had taken long enough to get on with her own stepmum, and now she suddenly found herself sharing responsibility for two mini-humans. Her party days gave way to early starts, jokes about farts, games of hide-and seek, and delicate negotiations with her partner’s ex and a cast of many. When Kelly got pregnant, stitching together the patchwork quilt of their new tribe got even trickier.In this brilliantly funny, deeply insightful and moving memoir, Kelly tells of how her whole world changed when she became a stepdaughter, how it changed again when she became a stepmum, and how blended families rock her world.About the author Kelly Chandler is a writer and editor, and has contributed to The Age, The Lifted Brow, The Big Issue, The New Zealand Herald and Griffith Review, among others. A former editor of Voiceworks, she was also chair of the National Young Writers’ Festival and journalist trainer at the Independent newspaper in Vanuatu. Kelly Chandler lives in Melbourne with her husband, son, and two spare sons.