Half a Wife
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Product Description
Book Description
How one highflyer completely rethought her work and family life, and what doing it differently could mean for parents everywhere.
Product Description
For most families, it remains the ultimate dilemma: how to balance a happy, healthy family life with the demands and rewards of work. When Gaby Hinsliff realised that she couldn't continue to work 60-hour weeks, spend time with her child and expect to stay happily married, there was only one solution. She quit, and decided to start again from scratch.
Half a Wife tells the story of that leap into the dark and proposes positive, practical solutions for piecing together what at times can seem like an impossible jigsaw. It encourages working parents to rethink traditional set ups - at home, at work, in relationships - to the mutual benefit of the whole family. The result? A much more egalitarian family life, where both partners can work if they want to, both share the care and both get back a little bit of a life as a result.
Based on personal experience but also drawing on new thinking from politics, psychology, anthropology and even architecture, Half a Wife is a guide for guilt-torn parents who are teetering on the edge, but it is also a wake-up call to opinion leaders. It is essential - and uplifting - reading for anyone who feels the visceral pull of home, but also the lure of meaningful work.
'A wonderfully sane and helpful book. Better than Calpol. I only wish it had been around when I became a mother. Gaby Hinsliff has written an invaluable guide for any parent struggling to reconcile their twin
passions for their children and their work.' Allison Pearson, author of I Don't Know How She Does It
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Vine™ Review
(What's this?)
Do you recall Gaby Hinsliff as political editor of the Observer? Her thoughtful well researched features always caught my eye and I've enjoyed some articles from her blog, Used to be Somebody. Now, she has taken her experiences of life as a working mum, her experiences of finding different ways to work, and turned them in to a thoughtful and in depth book. I love the title. At home I often say that I need a wife too, someone who doesn't mind focussing on the household admin and domestic chores.
I wouldn't read this if you're looking for a quick fix to the trials of working parenthood: perhaps there isn't one. Do read it if you want your ways of thinking to be challenged, to discover interesting research on family dynamics, plus to get some fascinating insights into how Hinsliff has come up with a work/life balance that suits her.
I wouldn't read this if you're looking for a quick fix to the trials of working parenthood: perhaps there isn't one. Do read it if you want your ways of thinking to be challenged, to discover interesting research on family dynamics, plus to get some fascinating insights into how Hinsliff has come up with a work/life balance that suits her.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Vine™ Review
(What's this?)
As a new parent, I was enticed by the cover of this book. I was hoping to find some ideas that might be helpful when my partner returns to work but this wasn't really the case.
The book is well-written and an interesting read. There are lots of good ideas but these are more aimed at companies and the government, not the average family.
Overall, this was interesting but offered no real solutions.
The book is well-written and an interesting read. There are lots of good ideas but these are more aimed at companies and the government, not the average family.
Overall, this was interesting but offered no real solutions.
7 of 8 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback|Amazon Vine™ Review
(What's this?)
This isn't the book that the cover suggests. First and foremost, it's not a 'guide'. It's an extended and well-researched study into the work/life balance of the modern British family in current society, but if like me you're part of a new family and looking for advice about how to strike the right balance between family and personal finance and career, you might not find as much in here as the cover blurb suggests.
The first half of the book gathers together, in a very readable way, lots of recent information and personal accounts of how the modern family operates- how common one-parent families are, the positives and negatives of being a working Dad or a working Mum, the way in which employers currently look at new parents, how people struggle with not having enough hours in the day, and more. It's thought-provoking to a new parent like myself, and admirably candid- despite being described as "uplifting" on the back cover, it doesn't pull any punches with some of the less optimistic statistics that are out there.
The second half of the book wanders off-course. Hinsliff is the ex-political editor of the Observer and it shows in two negative ways here.
Firstly, she is assuredly a 'high-flyer' compared to most of the people that might read this book, and what may be intended as advice to the reader begins to come across as indulgent autobiographical reminiscing. If your wage is in the higher tax bracket and you can afford a nanny, maybe you'll disagree, but I didn't find any real 'working class' (or even 'lower middle-class') advice here, and instead of feeling solidarity, I ended up feeling resentful of how Hinsliff's previous success allowed her the luxury of being able to change her career and relocate on a whim. Similarly many of the people she speaks to are white collar executives at management level, not 'normal' staff. If you find finances and career more of a struggle than she does, then you end up feeling jealous of Hinsliff and many of her interviewees, not helped by them.
Secondly the only real advice chapter in the book is the last (and longest) chapter at the end- and it's not advice for people, it's advice for the Government. Hinsliff either is or was part of a government task force to encourage flexible working, and this chapter seems like one of their reports paraphrased. Hinsliff stands on her political (and even party-political) soapbox and tells us how the Government should do things differently. All well and good, and putting aside how some of her manifesto clearly comes from some sort of dreamland, and also the short shelf life it inevitably has (clearly written in late 2011 and out-of-date within months), is it really part of a "Working Family's Guide"? No it's not. It's a massive chunk of politics and it feels like it's in the wrong book.
I've told my partner to read this book, as it will definitely be a conversation starter and some food-for-thought between us. However I've suggested she stops at page 143, because after that it becomes a bit of a waste of time.
The first half of the book gathers together, in a very readable way, lots of recent information and personal accounts of how the modern family operates- how common one-parent families are, the positives and negatives of being a working Dad or a working Mum, the way in which employers currently look at new parents, how people struggle with not having enough hours in the day, and more. It's thought-provoking to a new parent like myself, and admirably candid- despite being described as "uplifting" on the back cover, it doesn't pull any punches with some of the less optimistic statistics that are out there.
The second half of the book wanders off-course. Hinsliff is the ex-political editor of the Observer and it shows in two negative ways here.
Firstly, she is assuredly a 'high-flyer' compared to most of the people that might read this book, and what may be intended as advice to the reader begins to come across as indulgent autobiographical reminiscing. If your wage is in the higher tax bracket and you can afford a nanny, maybe you'll disagree, but I didn't find any real 'working class' (or even 'lower middle-class') advice here, and instead of feeling solidarity, I ended up feeling resentful of how Hinsliff's previous success allowed her the luxury of being able to change her career and relocate on a whim. Similarly many of the people she speaks to are white collar executives at management level, not 'normal' staff. If you find finances and career more of a struggle than she does, then you end up feeling jealous of Hinsliff and many of her interviewees, not helped by them.
Secondly the only real advice chapter in the book is the last (and longest) chapter at the end- and it's not advice for people, it's advice for the Government. Hinsliff either is or was part of a government task force to encourage flexible working, and this chapter seems like one of their reports paraphrased. Hinsliff stands on her political (and even party-political) soapbox and tells us how the Government should do things differently. All well and good, and putting aside how some of her manifesto clearly comes from some sort of dreamland, and also the short shelf life it inevitably has (clearly written in late 2011 and out-of-date within months), is it really part of a "Working Family's Guide"? No it's not. It's a massive chunk of politics and it feels like it's in the wrong book.
I've told my partner to read this book, as it will definitely be a conversation starter and some food-for-thought between us. However I've suggested she stops at page 143, because after that it becomes a bit of a waste of time.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
A treasure of a book
What a great book - a "must read" for every working family, especially those who are struggling somewhat to find a balance between work and personal life. Read more
Published 13 days ago by A customer
Love it!
I am reading this book and absolutely love it. I left my job with a large company having had my first child in 2010, and am now working for myself and this book really rang true... Read more
Published 28 days ago by natski
Not quite what I'd imagined but gives some food for thought.
I don't really know what I'd expected to find between the covers of the book but I didn't feel that it delivered what it promised from the blurb; "a guide for guilt-torn parents"... Read more
Published 1 month ago by SJSmith
Beware: you will be liable to re-think everything
I titled my review "you will be liable to re-think everything", though let me be clear that I do not mean this in a bad way. Read more
Published 1 month ago by Dr. K. E. Patrick
Interesting read
I usually avoid books about the traumas of the working mother like the plague as they tend to support one extreme or the other. This book is different. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Cath B
From one working mother to another
As a working mother I struggle to put some perspective on what I do, I'm a part time worker but also a part time mother... jack of all trades rings a bell... Read more
Published 2 months ago by Ms. Danielle K. Smith
Not what I expected
I thought this book would be humourous and full of helpful suggestions to help me balance my job as a Senior Manager with my working husband and our 9 year old twins..... Read more
Published 2 months ago by FLB
Urgent and compelling call to arms
Gaby Hinsliff used to be political editor of the Observer. She had a busy, demanding but hugely rewarding career. She was successful and influential. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Rose's Dad
Thoughtful, but would it work for everyone?
Most firms these days have policies on work-life balance, flexible working and family friendly shift patterns. Read more
Published 2 months ago by John
Superb - sounds like common sense, so why don't we act on it?
This book isn't a "self-help" book for parents (mums?) with tips on how to get organised so you can get your life under control. Read more
Published 3 months ago by joc66
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