The Mouse-Proof Kitchen: A Novel

I truly love this book. It made me feel. It made me think. It had me all over the emotional board. I could not stop reading, falling asleep with the Kindle open to the page I was reading.
Anna and Tobias go through a lot of swinging thoughts and emotions. I can understand it. I have a child, also a girl, who was born beautiful. Within her first year she would begin having seizures, at one point they were counted as 80 a day. Later I had custody of my grandson, another beautiful child. Within six months we knew something was drastically wrong. Then I was given the diagnosis of autism. Unless you have been there you cannot imagine all the different things going on in your head. The author captures that mixture of denial, confusion, hunger show more for knowledge and answers, the terror and ultimately the love. Everyone reacts differently but I think we all go through certain stages. The knowledge and answer quest. What exactly is wrong? What does that mean? What do we do? Did I do something wrong to cause it? The denial. Oh my. No. It cannot be this. She doesn’t look this bad. It must be something else. Something easier. The confusion and terror. What are they saying? How can we cope with this? It is too much. I don’t know what to do? What if she dies? What if she needs more care than I can give her? How will I let go if it is needed? The anger and grief. Oh yes there is anger. It is the dark secret. No one wants to talk about it or acknowledge it. If you do then people are aghast and judgmental. Yet how do you work through it if you cannot express it? How do you get to the final stages of acceptance and love if you are burying this step?
The author takes us through that. I think, hope really, that Anna and Tobias are written of in the extreme and therefore not realistic way. They are somewhat selfish as they repeatedly talk of abandoning Freya so they can continue on with their perfect life. They do horrible things. Anna and Tobias are stuck in the process. Anna tries to acknowledge the anger and talk about it. However people judge you when you do and she gets judged. So she then keeps it to herself though we are privy to her thoughts and feelings. I liked Anna though there were times I wanted to shout at and shake her. Tobias I really did not care for until the end chapters. I was horrified by some of the things in the book but ultimately I understood a lot of it. I am not saying I agree with the things that happened. It never crossed my mind to give up either my daughter or my grandson, nor did I ever think my life would be better if they passed. Though I was often stressed, (I was a single mom with a limited support system), I never went as far as Anna. I do understand the overwhelming stress and love combination, which the author captures.
I loved Saira Shah’s writing. She is a detailed writer, gifted with the ability to bring you into each scene. Her description of France brought the beauty into my mind. I could picture perfectly the kitchen, the rat infiltration, Anna’s obsessive canning and the scene of Anna's breakdown. Saira Shah breathes life into a difficult story.

This is a gripping book. I believe it is one of those books you will either love or hate. I don’t see much middle ground. I believe it will make some angry, (my post may also), but this is good. People talk when something makes them angry. This is a book that should be talked about and analyzed. It is a book that should make you question and examine yourself closely. I cannot recommend this book enough. I certainly hope it makes it way to book clubs. It is destined to be one of the top books of 2013. show less

In Saira Shah's debut novel, The Mouse-Proof Kitchen, Anna and Tobias's plans - to leave London for an idyllic cottage in Provence where Anna can raise Freya while working part time as a chef and Tobias can chase lucrative work as a film music composer - are thrown into disarray when their daughter is born. Unexpectedly, the doctors have told them that Freya has brain malformations that indicate she will have severe cognitive and physical disabilities and neither Anna nor Tobias feel they will be able to cope with her needs. Tobias suggests abandoning their newborn in the hospital but Anna, despite her very real concern about her ability to love and care for their daughter, is persuaded to take Freya home 'for a while'. Reluctant to show more concede the death of their dreams, Anna and Tobias move to a partly derelict farmhouse in a remote region of France where they are faced with a kitchen infested by rodents, and a daughter they must learn to love.

The Mouse-Proof Kitchen is a moving yet darkly subversive story inspired by, but not based upon, the author's own life experience. It is an exaggeration of emotion, domestic drama and dysfunction in the face of adversity, exploring the disruption of the 'best laid schemes of mice and men'.

While Tobias buries himself in work, Anna tries desperately to re-gather the shards of her broken dreams but her reality is a kitchen infested by rodents, an unhelpful husband and the relentless needs of her daughter. Over the course of a year, as they struggle to accept their new circumstances, they battle with resentment, tiredness and guilt.
Despite their glaring faults as parents, Anna and Tobias do provoke sympathy. They are both terrified to love Freya and become attached to a child whose life expectancy is limited and whose needs are unending.

Respite from the emotional maelstrom comes from a supporting cast of quirky characters that make their way to Les Rajons including teenage hippy Lizzy, the angelic Kerim and Anna's visiting mother as well as neighbors Julien and Ludovic. Each character challenges Anna in particular to reexamine her notions about motherhood, family, marriage and in their own unique way, help Anna and Tobias on their journey to acceptance.

Confronting, funny and touching, The Mouse-Proof Kitchen is a remarkable novel about the reshaping of dreams and unconditional love. show less

I found it absolutely engrossing, the ups and the downs of someone's life - or two people's lives, really - falling to utter pieces. The parents snap from lovely and loving to selfish and cowardly within the space of one sentence in several cases, and the pain they feel jumps at the reader in those stark contrasts. Somewhere I saw a description of "darkly funny." I don't know that I was ever moved to laugh or found much of anything funny - it was a heavy, thought-provoking book (much like Storyteller's Daughter) with an intensity of emotion that was at once painful to read and unputdownable.

This is one of those books I picked up thinking I would just browse it, not expecting much. But the story caught me up and I found it a great read. Anna, a gourmet chef, has her life all planned out. She and her husband, Tobias, will have their first child, a girl named Freya, and move to the south of France, where she will teach in a cooking school and Tobias will do...something. However, Freya is born with serious disabilities.Anna and Tobias cannot afford a house in Provence and end up moving to a decrepit, rat infested farmhouse in the north of France. Throughout the story, Anna and Tobias struggle with their desires to follow their own dreams and their alternating love for Freya and the frustration and fear her health issues show more brings. It turns out nothing in life is simple and every decision, no matter how "right" it "feels" comes with its own lost opportunities and sacrifices. Beautifully written without being overly sentimental, this book will ring true to any parent who has ever wondered how to weigh their own desires and dreams against their obligations to their children. show less

Anna and her husband Tobias eagerly anticipate the arrival of their first child. When Freya is born, the parents learn she will never develop the way most children do, that she will live a short and difficult life. Anna and Tobias, nevertheless, buy an old home in France and decide to take each day as it comes with Freya.

I suspect this is a very honest look at the anxieties and pain and burdens and resentment and, yes, deep love that comes with having a child who doesn’t grow and change as expected. It’s a beautiful story of the way regular people try to face, then shirk, then try to face again enormous, lonely, and unexpected responsibilities, full of the frustrations and anger and joy that these responsibilities bring.

An excellent choice for book clubs.

This book was written from the heart by an author who, herself, has a severely disabled child and similarly, made the decision to move to France. While a lot of the narrative is not autobiographical, it also didn't feel so much like a novel. The emotions and reactions were too true, too heartfelt to be simply fiction and it wasn't until I realised the author's history that I could make sense of it.
I was blown away but the brutal honesty of trying to adjust your life to the shock and implications of raising a child who had absolutely no hope of living an independent life, never to walk, talk, or feed herself.

Some of the characters were a bit 'off the wall'. Lizzy, the flaky teenager who lives in a show more storage container in the grounds of the old house, was an extreme example. But you couldn't help but love them. Even Anna's infuriating mother, who reassuringly announces that "even a slug can learn". Only Tobias, Anna's husband, really annoyed me. I could understand that he wanted to shut himself off from reality, but to move to a broken down old house and not raise a hammer to do any repairs, was beyond comprehension.

This was an interesting mix of misery memoir and travel book, well balanced and wryly humorous.
It's an excellent book club choice; our book club was split in its reactions to the situation and it made for an enthusiastic discussion.
Search for the interview published in The Telegraph for the true inside story and photographs of the family. show less

This heart-tugging emotional story told in a memoir-like format is intimately introspective, brutally honest yet deliciously warm with dollops of life-affirming humor. The narrator is Anna, a chef who loves order and this is accomplished by planning out her life dreams. Her partner is Tobias, a charming musician who is more carefree in his approach to life. But they are soon in a spot that stops them in their tracks – daughter Freya is born with profound disabilities. Anna worries what if she does not love Freya enough; Tobias worries what if we do, while an impulse buy of run-down animal infested farmhouse further challenges the couple’s past and future commitments. A glimpse into the healthcare systems of Britain and France and show more alternatives for disabled children was enlightening. This touching story of love, family, and loyalty is enhanced by a cast of eccentric secondary characters. show less