this is the cover of my new book

Hi Loves,

This is the cover of my new book: 

And this is how I feel about it:

Happy. Swoony. Blushy. Obsessed.

It took a lot of less pleasant, but no less important feelings to get here. The brilliant designers at my book publisher worked their asses off. The earliest iterations were splashy and fun, the kind of book you might see at an airport kiosk. But I worried it looked like a tabloid or a ransom note. I declared emphatically, “I DO NOT do cherry red.” I countered with a very badly-designed alternative I created myself in Canva. They were kind and professional and proposed, Let’s just start over.

And then they sent me this.

I like this cover because it looks pretty, dressed in cream—no, let’s call it parchment—and accessorized with all of my favorite colors from the Blu Dot catalogue.

I like it because it looks literary but playful, the serif and sans serif fonts sitting side-by-side, giving off, as one friend put it, "Gloria Steinem meets Girl Scout Vibes."

I like it mostly because it has these gorgeous silhouettes popping out of letters like people in apartment building windows, hinting at how this book is not just a memoir but a manifesto, not just a book about about a me but a we, a book about how all of us—moms, non-moms, and those somewhere in between—can find love and joy and identity and meaning as someone other than a mother.

(Um, also, I cannot wait for you to meet the wide swath of women featured in the book, some of whom you may already know like Sarah Sentilles and Margaret Brunson Jessica Slice and Becky Blanco, Melody Moezzi and Emily Grey, Karen Swallow Prior and yes, even my own pastor.)

It was a sensitive process. As any book that has "woman" in the subtitle is. We debated that word "woman." I asked one of my wise friends, Father lizzie, if she thought it was too binary and she said, yeah, it is binary, but maybe that's what you're trying to help people see, how these expectations for parenting/not-parenting bear differently on people who are femme of center, and I said, yes, exactly, and she said, Plus, it needs to sell. And I said, yes, that, too. 

Making this book—not just writing it but like making all these tiny, not so tiny decisions to go along with it—was a lifeline of purpose for me during the pandemic. And I so, so, so, hope it will be a lifeline of purpose for readers who are tired of the shitty scripts about a life well-lived, tired of being told what is or isn't wrong with them, what they will or won't regret, what they do or don't know about love. Because this book is a celebration, as Kate Bowler so generously said about it, "of love in all its forms."

It's available for pre-order now, please and thank you and compliments only at this time.

XO,
Erin

P.S. True Story: Pre-orders are really wonderful for authors. They give booksellers a sense of the demand for our upcoming books. Like, should we stock 3 or 13? Oh, man look at all these pre-orders from people tired of the shitty scripts, let’s do 30!

P.P.S. Hot Tip: You can pre-order the book from any of your beloved booksellers, and if they don’t yet have copies ordered for the store, you can request that they do. Like, Oh, you don’t know? Let me tell you about the next best book in parenting/not-parenting.

P.P.P.S. Also This: If you buy the book now, you’ll soon get access to a FREE BONUS GIFT (yes, yes, sort of like Clinique) that I’ve been scheming for you. Just save your pre-order information, and stay tuned to this newsletter.