First there was Bridget Jones. Then came the Nannies. Now meet Claire McLeod, a twenty-something American girl living in Portland, Oregon. Claire's got big problems: her mother's a tyrant, her sister's a lesbian, her father's in Omaha.

Claire's peaceful, if dull, existence is shattered when her mother arrives in Portland for an unexpected--and unwelcome--visit. Armed with a sharp tongue, a critical eye, and enough Weekender Wear to make anyone nervous, Mom has mysteriously left Dad at home in the Midwest. It's not enough that Claire's job as a telephone survey-taker is excruciatingly irritating and her boyfriend has dumped her. No, now, embarrassed by her dead-end job and flatlining love life, she must also bear the weight of Mom's critical eagle eye while trying to close the rift between her mother and her sister, solve the riddle of her missing father, climb a shaky corporate ladder, stalk a cute coworker, reinvent herself, and maybe--just maybe--find a little happiness.

By turns tender and insightful--but always hilarioulsy funny--sMothering is a novel you can't put down.