Shirley Jackson is a famous author, know mainly for her horror stories and novels, such as the short story The Lottery and the novels The Haunting of Hill House and We Have Always Lived In the Castle. But she also wrote in a lighter vein about being a mom to a large family, Life Among the Savages in 1953 and Raising Demons in 1957.
Life Among the Savages begins with the family moving from New York City to a small rural town in the northeastern United States. Jackson tells the story of adapting to a more restricted life and also bringing two more kids into the world. Actually, the story ends with the arrival of the fourth child, Barry.
Reading these stories, one senses that life was not quite as jolly as Shirley Jackson paints it to be. In fact, there are clear hints that this setting was the seed that grew to be her famous horror novels and stories. Still, I did find the family stories to be interesting if not the laugh fest I was rather hoping for.
Here is a review by The Guardian.
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