24.7.13

Guest Review: The Baby Diaries by Sam Binnie

Our guest review today comes from Jean, she was interested in reviewing The Baby Diaries by Sam Binne as she had just welcomed her first grandchild into the world! Here's what Jean thought:


The hilarious and heart-warming second in the series from the author of The Wedding Diaries.
"I'd be sick right now, but I never like to reinforce a cliché."
A few weeks after Kiki and Thom return from honeymoon, Kiki finds there's a noticeable absence. An extremely serious noticeable absence of something, it turns out, Kiki now realises she was pretty glad about. One pregnancy test later, Kiki's breaking the "good news" (Thom: Wow. We're so… Edwardian.) and rewriting all the plans she'd made before.
With an ever-expanding waistline, her nightmare childhood "friend" Annie pregnant too, all the problem authors at Polka Dot Books she could (not) wish for and an army of NW London's Smug Mothers to deal with, these nine months might not be the nine months of blooming relaxation she'd been promised…


I’ve been following Dot Scribble’s book reviews for quite a while and I often read the books she recommends, so I was really pleased when she sent out an SOS for people to review some books for her. There were six and I wasn’t sure which one to chose until I spotted The Baby Diaries by Sam Binnie, because my first grandchild had just arrived and it seemed the perfect choice!
As the name suggests, it’s written like Bridget Jones’s Diary, but whereas Bridget lists the calories she’s eaten and the cigarettes she’s smoked, Sam’s character, Kiki, makes a list of things to do to get ready for her baby. It’s written in a humorous style which kept me chuckling all the way through. I wasn’t too sure about the dialogue being written as a script at first, but I soon got used to the rhythm of the chapters with their vivid descriptions of Kiki’s world of publishing and antenatal classes. However, I wished that I had read The Wedding Diaries first to get to know all the characters Kiki mentions.
The progress of Kiki’s pregnancy kept me glued to the book. In fact I was so engrossed while I waited in the car for my daughter, that when she opened the door, it made me jump! The first days after Kiki's baby is born are captured very well. I especially like her parents coming and taking the baby out for three hours so she can sleep. I’ll have to offer to do that myself!
Some things have changed in the past 30 years, and I'm glad to see that the techniques I was taught in my NCT classes have been adopted by the NHS. One interesting thing is that Kiki (and my daughter) packed snacks to eat during labour. In my day you were only allowed ice cubes to suck, in case you needed a caesarian!
The story continues with the trials of going back to work and finishes with the baby’s six-month birthday party, followed by a section on advice for the newly pregnant mother.
I think that it’s a great read for mothers-to-be, new mothers and new grannies, and I shall certainly be reading The Wedding Diaries soon!  

Jean's Rating: 5/5
Publisher: Avon
Pages: 384 

Many thanks to Avon for sending a copy of the book to review, The Baby Diaries is out now! 

2 comments:

Jean Bull said...

Thanks Dot, for letting me review The Baby Diaries. As you can see I really enjoyed it!

Dot said...

Thank you so much for reviewing the book Jean, I'm really pleased that you enjoyed it!

All change here!

I have made the decision to stop doing written reviews on here for a little while. I shall keep this page open but for the time being I sha...