A self-absorbed narrator wanting to become a writer but failing to observe the world around them. Much like many of Moore’s stories in this collection, it is witty and wry, deconstructing previously held ideas around self-help. Many of us will probably relate to the insecurities and anxieties around writing that the narrator faces. The mother-daughter relationship plays an integral role in this story forming a backdrop to the way society determines who is good enough to write and who is held back.
Published in Self-Help, Alfred A. Knopf, 1985, and collected in The Collected Stories, Faber, 2008
A Personal Anthology 