Bringing Up Bebe by Pamela Druckerman

I picked this book up at the library last weekend and finished it in just a few days - I found it to be an easy, funny, interesting read.

Druckerman is an American journalist who finds herself living and raising children in Paris. She starts to notice that the French have a different attitude toward parenting and the role of children in their families and society as a whole, and that this attitude seems to produce children who eat, sleep and behave very well.

"Motherhood itself is a whole different experience in France. There's no role model for the harried new mom with no life of her own. French mothers assume that even good parents aren't at the constant service of their children, and that there's no need to feel guilty about this."

I don't think Druckerman has uncovered anything revolutionary and I would describe this book as more of a memoir than a parenting manual, but I really enjoyed this book. I found it interesting to see how children are raised in a culture other than ours and I think we could learn a thing or two from how they do things in France.

"I haven't got a theory. What I do have, spread out in front of me, is a fully functioning society of good little sleepers, gourmet eaters, and reasonably relaxed parents. I'm starting with that outcome and working backward to figure out how the French got there. It turns out that to be a different kind of parent, you don't just need a different parenting philosophy. You need a very different view of what a child actually is."

Anyone else read this one? What did you think?