Take Daily as Needed
Maeve Beaufort's family is messy and complicated, rife with competing demands, difficult compromises, and on-the-spot judgment calls. She is the single mother of Noelle, who has anaphylactic reactions to nuts, and Norm, a nonconformist child whom everyone wants to diagnose. Her father is spending his retirement on high-ticket items he doesn't need, her children's teachers are suggesting medication, and her mood-swinging mother is threatening to move in. Newly diagnosed herself with Crohn's disease, Maeve feels as though she is failing herself, her parents, and her children. But with spirit and determination--and a healthy dose of survival humor--she gives it her best go. Anyone who has ever felt overwhelmed, underappreciated, underpaid, and underwater will find a kindred spirit in Maeve.
Feminist themes feature prominently in this novel, highlighting the politicized and gendered dimensions of caregiving. . . . The novel is a meditation on relationships and the many ways they erode and sustain us, for better or for worse.'--Brianna Cheng, Intima: A Journal of Narrative Medicine
Trueblood engagingly describes many aspects of family life in a manner that is authentic, honest, and often uncomfortable. The characters and relationships are multifaceted, and the reader is allowed to witness to the love, anger, frustration, change, and resilience in a way that rings true to life.'--Wordgathering: A Journal of Disability Poetry and Literature
Trueblood makes great use of the unconventional form, molding Maeve's story into a vivid portrait of independent womanhood.'--Booklist
Kathryn Trueblood takes the world of medical humanities by storm.'--Anelyse Morris, Bellingham Alive!
I am a dedicated word nerd and have been known to swoon over a perfectly crafted sentence. And this book has many such moving and evocative pearls.'--Lene Andersen, The Seated View
A great read about life and family.'--Sheryl Chan, A Chronic Voice
Maeve, a struggling paralegal living in Washington state who wants to be the best parent she can be while still remaining autonomous, is funny and feisty and not willing to give up on herself or her family.'--Cascadia Weekly
Trueblood confidently sculpts her protagonist. . . . Readers will appreciate the character wrinkles each new story turns up.'--Publishers Weekly
Kathryn [Trueblood] accurately portrays the rawness of living with a chronic condition, the cathartic grieving for one's life before diagnosis, and the turbulent journey of highs and lows of living with chronic illness.'--Jenna Ziegler, The Comical Colon
A deftly crafted novel showcasing author Kathryn Trueblood's genuine knack for a narrative-driven storytelling style that is thoroughly reader engaging from beginning to end.'--Mary Cowper's Bookshelf, Midwest Book Review
How do we survive as human beings, since medicines do not heal emotional wounds? Maeve's prescription for survival is her dark humor and her refusal to give up. When she thinks about the women she knows who have not made it, she cheers that she is still alive in spite of the crushing struggle. And we, her fans and cheerleaders, cheer too.'--Mom Egg Review
I loved the book from the very opening to the ending. . . . Each of the characters--Maeve's daughter, son, and mother, especially, but also her brother, ex-husband, and father as well--make us laugh, not at them but at ourselves and our own predicaments and situations.'--Sheila Bender, Sheila Bender's Writing It Real
Take Daily As Needed is the perfect example of how some of the best art often reflects life. . . . It's not the illness itself Trueblood is examining here so much as the wider condition of womanhood and the roles and responsibilities it entails.'--Michelle Curtis, The Zebra Pit
Never a false note, never a line of dialogue that didn't feel heartbreakingly real, the work seems to open a seam in the experience of parenting that has never been pulled open before.'--Ashley Shelby, author of South Pole Station: A Novel
Take Daily as Needed crosses and occupies the lives of readers in many generations from Baby Boomers to Gen X to Gen Y and Millennials: in short anyone who is a parent, has a parent, or has been in a relationship that requires management, healing, sacrifice, and/or emotional intelligence.'--Shawn Wong, author of American Knees
[These] stories offer a compelling look into the sadly common and unfair expectation that women who physically and mentally care for children and aging parents ought to be the ones who compromise their own intellectual and professional passions.'--Kate Gale, author of The Goldilocks Zone
Kathryn Trueblood is the author of The Baby Lottery and The Sperm Donor’s Daughter and Other Tales of Modern Family. A recipient of the Goldenberg Prize in Fiction and the Red Hen Press Short Story Award, she teaches at Western Washington University in Bellingham, Washington.
Time Bomb Baby
The Medicated Marriage
Take Daily as Needed
The No-Tell Hotel
Taking My Father Hostage
Fuck You! Till Next Christmas
A Shot to the Head
Pack Something Black
Totaled
Self-Defense
The Whore of Healing
Anything but That
Who Will Love Me Now?
Acknowledgments
