Red Clocks by Leni Zumas showcases the different aspects of relationships throughout the book however, my blog post will focus on motherhood between the different characters. Zumas did a magnificent job on the different lifestyles of motherhood: those struggling to become a mother, those wondering if motherhood was worth it, the feeling of not wanting to be a mother, and a mother who gave up her child to give the child a better life than the mother thought she could provide.
eeIn Red Clocks, relationships and motherhood was a main theme that I saw featured throughout the book from character to character. Starting with the biographer, to me I was kind of happy or astonished that Ro/Miss wasn’t or didn’t receive a child in the book. Whenever she discussed the main reason she wanted to have a child, she never knew why. Although she “claimed” that it wasn’t in replace of a romantic partner, I beg to differ, but I do think it could be for her to have a chance to start her own lineage due to the fact that she lost her brother and is the last of her family to further her family tree. Another thing I found questionable was the reason as to why she didn’t ask Mattie for her baby. In my opinion, it seemed less dangerous than the chance of them being caught trying – receiving – an abortion. I believe that Mattie would have given Ro/Miss the baby, due to the fact that Ro was a huge inspiration for Mattie. I questioned why Ro/Miss was very distant from her father due to him being the only person left in her family that I’m guessing she had the most contact with. I believe that she may have felt bad for not being able to take care of her brother, and could probably be upset to face her dad with the guilt of her brother. (“An Article discussing how family can become unbalanced after a death in the family”). In her relationship with Susan, Ro envied her because of the fact that Susan was capable of having children and often seemed not to want the role of motherhood anymore while Ro is struggling to have her own or even adopt someone else’s baby. Matilda – Mattie – to me was a complex character, she was very naïve especially when it came to Ephraim. I know she was a teenage girl so she felt the need to have sex with Ephraim because he was supposedly someone that she was in love with. Even though I know that he didn’t care anything about her due to the fact he was caught kissing another girl. For some reason I don’t know why she never told her parents about her pregnancy, they seemed like they cared for her really well and that they would’ve taken good care of her and the pregnancy instead of her sneaking around trying to get abortions. A reason being that Mattie didn’t want to have the baby because she didn’t want to go through the experience of childbirth. She wanted to further her education and go to the Math Academy and felt that having a baby would get in the way of doing what she truly wanted to do. Susan was probably one of the characters I believe had the most growth throughout the book. She started off very submissive to her husband – Didier – until it got to the point that she was able to tell him that they needed a break/separation that would probably grow into a divorce down the line. I don’t know why she let him speak to her however he felt the need and teach the kids such terms that they kept a secret from the mom. Bex to me was very difficult to handle and I know Susan saw it from her being so much like her father. I was excited that she found Byron, and was upset that things didn’t develop further between them but then again, Byron seemed very iffy when talking to Susan. It was as if he could sense something developing between them but didn’t want to cross that line with his colleague’s wife. I was really hoping that Susan was going to go back to law school and maybe finish what she had started before she met Didier. This would be the classic woman move to do after leaving your spouse, especially when you’re unhappy. I didn’t really hold any feelings towards the Mender until she got arrested for something that she never did. I had a feeling she wasn’t going to tell Mattie that she was her birth mother due to the fact that she seemed happy with her family. The Mender found herself looking at women – younger women – a lot sexually. I wondered if she had experienced something with men in her past; I know she had a relationship with Cotter – the father of Mattie – but she seemed to be more into women then into men, and I would have liked to see a deeper background of where her desire for women came into play. This book played a lot into motherhood showing the ups and downs of motherhood. How hard it could be for women who want to get pregnant and not being able to, mothers who are going through ‘differences’ with their partner but not wanting to be the reason that her children parents aren’t together, or simply a mother who is watching a child she gave birth to through a lens you are not a part of. Red Clocks was a book that explored a lot of different aspects of motherhood that I never would have thought of especially at this time in my life.
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