If you've ever had an eyeball-to-eyeball row with an angry teenager - or even been that angry teenager - you'll be only too aware of the multilayered ambivalence which exists in mother-daughter re lationships, where love means always having to say you're sorry and encompasses anger, embarrassment, jealousy, sorrow and fear, and that's just for starters. But do you really want to read about it? Well, yes, if the quality of the writing is as high as in this anthology; open it on any page and you'll find a superbly crafted piece, from Colette's beautiful, tremulous "The Sempstress" to Sylvia Plath's quietly devastating "The Day Mr Prescott Died" to Alice Munro's exasperated, affectionate "Princess Ida". Cultures outside the Anglo-Saxon norm are touched on, too, though the gearchange to a more "primitive" writing style is a little awkward in some cases. Overall, though, it's a terrific read.
Arminta Wallace
