My Father Married Your Mother: Dispatches from the Blended Family

Jacquelyn Mitchard, Barbara Kingsolver, Roxana Robinson, Susan Cheever, and others share experiences of being stepdaughters, stepmothers, or ex-wives. Andrew Solomon writes about his relationship with his stepmother. Kate Christensen celebrates the stepfather who brought guidance to her life. There are essays from writers in the same family, each with a different take on his or her postnuclear situation: Phyllis Rose discusses her second husband's qualities as a stepfather, while her son, Ted Rose, writes about his tumultuous relationship with his stepbrother from his own father's remarriage. These poignant, heartfelt, sometimes biting tales remind us of the outdated myth of the perfect nuclear family while shedding light on what it means to forge relationships with stepfamily members.