Publishers Weekly
05/23/2022
In this frank and funny memoir, essayist Tea (How to Grow Up) spares no detail of her arduous odyssey of getting pregnant at 40. “I’m about to bring you into my inner world,” she promises readers, “during a period of time when that space was as wild, messy, hopeful, dizzy, tragic, terrifying, and openhearted as any era I’ve ever lived.” Despite the title, it takes a village to get the author pregnant, including an acupuncturist, a friendly witch, a number of friends to ferry fertility meds across the border, and a glamorous drag queen sperm donor. Every stage of Tea’s quest presents revelations devastating—like discovering uterine fibroids after months of failed insemination attempts—dazzling, and packed with information one may not expect when they’re expecting: ovulation (unexpectedly aggro), implantation (may cause bleeding), pregnancy (who knew it could change the shape of one’s eyes?). Taken as a whole, Tea’s unconventional “birth story” serves as a celebration of the human body, its hidden miracles, and, as she aptly puts it, “not just the dramatic climax of a last push and a first breath, but the story of a choice made, a dare accepted, a journey undertaken.” This heartfelt work embraces every facet of the human experience: heartache, hope, and—with a little luck—joy. (Aug.)
From the Publisher
"With humor, candor and the ease of a veteran storyteller, Tea reminds us that there is no making life in pursuit of a prefigured plan. We learn from what we least expect, propelled toward “the outer reaches of love, where it hits the limits of our understanding.” — New York Times Book Review
"Whether Tea is writing nonfiction—including her PEN Award-winning 2018 essay collection “Against Memoir”—or cult-favorite fiction, her work is her own, ringing in her unmistakable voice: wry, witty, authentic, down-to-earth but also way-up-in-the-clouds. Above all, it’s the self-deprecating, self-aware and ultimately self-loving honesty that distinguishes Tea’s way of life and her irresistible, evocative and wise way of writing about it." — Meredith Maran, Washington Post
"Tea’s account showcases the fluidity of contemporary identity and family bonds, but also of time and narrative. This overlapping of new romance and pregnancy, miscarriage and marriage, of triumph and vulnerability, of birth and death—and, we could add, of private joy amidst political despair—is a different kind of adventure. It’s not so much that one can move instantly from delight to despair, but that we experience both together, all the time." — New Republic
“Author, poet, tarot legend, and organizer Michelle Tea has long been known as a fairy godmother of the millennial queer set, and in this blazing new memoir, she approaches the subject of parenthood (and all the poking, prodding, jaw-dropping expense, and nosy questions that it can entail for LGBTQ+ parents) with her signature verve.” — Vogue
"Crack this marvel open in which Michelle Tea details “having” a baby in a way that’s part science experiment, part space voyage and maybe largest part prayer. She delivers her tale with enormous vulnerability, fierce honesty, and an unflagging commitment to the gnarly, frothy, performative condition(s) of giving birth and in the end she drops us all into an ecstatic basinet of total love. My God! Michelle is the best. Man can she live and write." — Eileen Myles, poet and author of Chelsea Girls
“Encouraging and subtly radical” — Vogue
“Winning, companionable, and intimate; [Tea] has a talent for letting you know her…The central question becomes: How do you have a baby and not lose yourself?” — The Nation
"Tea’s journey to motherhood involved tarot cards, astrology, and witches; a loving queer community; a caring partner; and medical practitioners sympathetic to a queer woman’s desire for a baby. Though many anecdotes are amusing, she reveals the emotional and physical cost of the “baby-making/baby-failing roller coaster” that completely dominated her life...A refreshingly entertaining, lighthearted memoir about a serious topic." — Kirkus Reviews
"Taken as a whole, Tea’s unconventional “birth story” serves as a celebration of the human body, its hidden miracles, and, as she aptly puts it, “not just the dramatic climax of a last push and a first breath, but the story of a choice made, a dare accepted, a journey undertaken.” This heartfelt work embraces every facet of the human experience: heartache, hope, and—with a little luck—joy." — Publishers Weekly
“Tea takes readers on a whirlwind ride of a complicated conception and pregnancy. [Her] experience is a uniquely queer and feminist one that is rarely at the forefront of these discussions. For readers learning about the more technical (and sometimes grisly) side effects of fertility treatments and pregnancy for the first time, Tea’s exuberance and zest for the experience will hopefully offer solace.” — Library Journal
"'Motherhood is psychedelic,' Michelle Tea writes in Knocking Myself Up, a book that gifts us a blow-by-blow of Tea’s journey in ecstatic, riotous, mind-altering colors. Watch out, though - the gossipy immediacy and hilarity of Tea’s voice may leave you unprepared for the “love as big as planets” that grows along the way, and eventually packs a real wallop. I’m so grateful for this necessary book, which makes me feel emboldened, buoyant, and less alone." — Maggie Nelson, award-winning author of The Argonauts
"Michelle Tea has pulled off the impossible—a frank, funny, compelling memoir about birth and parenthood that pulls no punches but still manages to make the whole affair sound like a grand adventure. She brings her trademark compassionate curiosity to the vast universe that is creation." — Kaitlyn Greenidge, author of Libertie and We Love You, Charlie Freeman
“Michelle Tea’s Knocking Myself Up takes the most quintessential human process— procreation—and completely reinvents what’s possible. Her trademark honesty and punk rock spirit are on full display here in her most indelible and unexpected book yet. People of all walks of life will find something to take away with them as we—as society—all grapple with what parenthood can and should really be.” — Isaac Fitzgerald, author of Dirtbag, Massachusetts
"Every book by Michelle Tea is a revelation. This book is a big fat reminder that the mess of life and the mess of making life are one and the same, with joy and goop and frustration and loss and blood and sudden! giddy! triumph!” — Daniel Handler, author of All The Dirty Parts
Kaitlyn Greenidge
"Michelle Tea has pulled off the impossible—a frank, funny, compelling memoir about birth and parenthood that pulls no punches but still manages to make the whole affair sound like a grand adventure. She brings her trademark compassionate curiosity to the vast universe that is creation."
Maggie Nelson
"'Motherhood is psychedelic,' Michelle Tea writes in Knocking Myself Up, a book that gifts us a blow-by-blow of Tea’s journey in ecstatic, riotous, mind-altering colors. Watch out, though - the gossipy immediacy and hilarity of Tea’s voice may leave you unprepared for the “love as big as planets” that grows along the way, and eventually packs a real wallop. I’m so grateful for this necessary book, which makes me feel emboldened, buoyant, and less alone."
Isaac Fitzgerald
Michelle Tea’s Knocking Myself Up takes the most quintessential human process— procreation—and completely reinvents what’s possible. Her trademark honesty and punk rock spirit are on full display here in her most indelible and unexpected book yet. People of all walks of life will find something to take away with them as we—as society—all grapple with what parenthood can and should really be.”
Eileen Myles
"Crack this marvel open in which Michelle Tea details “having” a baby in a way that’s part science experiment, part space voyage and maybe largest part prayer. She delivers her tale with enormous vulnerability, fierce honesty, and an unflagging commitment to the gnarly, frothy, performative condition(s) of giving birth and in the end she drops us all into an ecstatic basinet of total love. My God! Michelle is the best. Man can she live and write."
Daniel Handler
"Every book by Michelle Tea is a revelation. This book is a big fat reminder that the mess of life and the mess of making life are one and the same, with joy and goop and frustration and loss and blood and sudden! giddy! triumph!
Library Journal
05/01/2022
Tea (How To Grow Up) takes readers on a whirlwind ride of a complicated conception and pregnancy. While there is no shortage of information about pregnancy available to twenty-first century readers, Tea's experience is a uniquely queer and feminist one that is rarely at the forefront of these discussions. The journey takes the proverb "It takes a village to raise a child" very seriously with the addendum that it takes a village to conceive one, too. Tea's decision to be a mom reverberates through so many lives as they gather around to love and support her through the process. Never the one to mince words, Tea's prose is florid with personal descriptions of each part of the process: from the initial decision, the complications, a dozen of life pivots, to the eventual birth of her son. For readers learning about the more technical (and sometimes grisly) side effects of fertility treatments and pregnancy for the first time, Tea's exuberance and zest for the experience will hopefully offer solace. VERDICT Recommended to round-out parenting collections with a new perspective on family.—Halie Kearns
Kirkus Reviews
2022-05-17
An award-winning writer chronicles her attempts to get pregnant.
Guggenheim fellow and PEN/America Award winner Tea recounts in intimate, comic, and irreverent detail her four-year quest to get pregnant, beginning in 2011, when she was 40, a recovering alcoholic and addict who stabilized her mental state with antidepressants. Although happily independent, she felt firm in her decision to have a baby. Describing herself as “mostly gay,” the author realized that getting pregnant through sex with a man was unlikely. Among her many gay friends, Quentin, a “virile, healthy 28-year-old” drag queen, happily agreed to be her sperm donor, coming to her service every time she ovulated. A close friend stood by to shoot semen into her vagina with a syringe; soon, Orson, Tea’s new queerlover, took over the process. Tea’s journey to motherhood involved tarot cards, astrology, and witches; a loving queer community; a caring partner; and medical practitioners sympathetic to a queer woman’s desire for a baby. Though many anecdotes are amusing, she reveals the emotional and physical cost of the “baby-making/baby-failing roller coaster” that completely dominated her life. At first, she writes, she was “determined to graciously accept any inability to actually have a baby,” but after months of failed attempts, both with her homemade insemination technique and in vitro fertilization, she admits that “the feelings that accompany the surge of blood in my underwear are not so mild.” Tea shares the particular challenges that queer and trans individuals encounter when seeking medical help, and she records the bodily changes, mood swings, fears, and anxieties that she experienced, including worries about her response to her baby’s gender. “Folks in my world have separated sex from gender so wholly that there is no way to comfortably relax into the idea of a baby girl being like this, or a baby boy being like that.” Nevertheless, “whatever potential the baby expresses,” she felt ready.
A refreshingly entertaining, lighthearted memoir about a serious topic.
