Every Day is Mother's Day
 First edition (UK) | |
| Author | Hilary Mantel |
|---|---|
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Language | English |
| Publisher | Chatto and Windus |
Publication date | 1985 |
| Media type | |
| Pages | 230 |
| ISBN | 0-7011-2895-X |
| OCLC | 11631321 |
| Followed by | Vacant Possession |
Every Day is Mother's Day is the first novel by British author Hilary Mantel, published in 1985 by Chatto and Windus. It was inspired in part by Hilary Mantel's own experiences as a social work assistant at a geriatric hospital which involved visits to patients in the community and access to case notes, the loss of which play an important part of the novel.[1]
Plot introduction
It is a black comedy set in the mid-1970s and begins with the widowed spiritualist Evelyn Axon's discovery that her mentally handicapped daughter Muriel is pregnant. Isabel Field is the latest social worker to tackle the Axons but Evelyn is determined not to let anyone interfere with Muriel, whose condition she blames on her daughter's recent weekly visits to a daycare centre. Isabel Field herself is having an affair with the brother of Evelyn's neighbour and the story of this relationship is interwoven with that of Evelyn and Muriel's and the birth of the baby...
The story is continued in Hilary Mantel's next novel Vacant Possession.
Publication history
- 1985, UK, Chatto & Windus, ISBN 0-7011-2895-X, Hardback
- 1986, UK, Penguin, ISBN 0-14-008550-5, Paperback
- 2000, US, Owl, ISBN 0-8050-6272-6, Pub date 15 Mar 2000, Paperback
- 2001, UK, Chivers, ISBN 0-7540-4540-4, Pub date Jun 2001, Large print
- 2006, UK, Harper Perennial, ISBN 1-84115-339-7, Pub date 16 Jan 2006, Paperback
- 2010, US, Picador, ISBN 0-312-66803-1, Pub date 31 Aug 2010, Paperback
References
- ↑ Afterword of Harper Perenniel edition published 2006
- ↑ www.fantasticfiction.co.uk