Why Mummy Drinks: The Sunday Times Number One Bestselling Author

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His mother informed us that she had assumed his wife would be buying his advent calendars for him, now he was married, which came as something of a surprise to me, as I did not remember anything in our wedding vows about ‘To Be Your Bloody Mother From This Day Forth …’ I bought him a calendar the next year as a joke, but he didn’t seem to realise the joke part, going so far as to tell me that for future reference, he actually preferred a Thornton’s calendar to a Dairy Milk one, but he appreciated the thought. And so I continue to buy my forty-year-old husband an advent calendar every year, because apparently I am his mum now, and he is a spoilt child.” So many, laugh out loud moments. Don’t read this book in company, I couldn’t stop laughing. The worst bit was Semen Smoothies! Yes, I would have bought a new blender as well!! I’m not interfering. I just don’t think you’ve thought this through properly, so don’t get annoyed with me because I’m helping.’ Mummy’s carefully laid plans of perfectly figging up the pudding, while sitting by the fire reading aloud from A Christmas Carol to her rapt rosy-cheeked audience, are suddenly in tatters. Don’t do what? You’re the one who’s just announced they’re not coming home. It’s not like you’ve ruined Christmas or anything!’ I snapped sarcastically.

If you feel that you're not one of the 'in gang' and that everyone else's lives are going much more smoothly than yours then you'll find you are not alone. Job dissatisfaction, less than perfect children, extended family problems, money difficulties...are all relatable and laughable topics that can be found in this book. And if you don't mind swearing (or acronyms for swearing usually used in text messages) then you're probably more likely to enjoy this book.I’ve always loved Christmas. Ever since I can remember, I’ve been convinced every year that this year – this year it would be perfect. This would be the year when everyone’s dreams would come true: the children would frolic, my carefully chosen gifts would be received with rapturous expressions on rosy-cheeked faces, I’d bear the bronzed and gleaming turkey to the table on some sort of (yet to be sourced) Golden Platter to stunned Oohs! and Ahhs!, and everyone would say, ‘Oh Ellen, this is marvellous. Verily, you are the Queen of Christmas’ before Simon kissed me under the mistletoe.

Well it is good to know I am not the only one! This book is so true to life that it has made me feel a million times better about myself! Gills Sims has written this in a really true to life format where you empathise with the main character throughout, at no point did I feel she was in the wrong! I enjoyed the book. It was very funny but rather risqué. I particularly found the Easter Egg hunt and the Fire Work display very memorable. If there was a problem with the book, it was the bad language and too much information about her Sisters children's Toilet habits." Maureen. Not at Christmas! Judgy loves Christmas. He’d be furious. Opening presents is his favourite thing. And Flora is too old for kennels, and what if she dies? And Barry? Well, poor little Barry, how you can abandon Barry at Christmas?’ I was trying very hard to hide my disappointment that Jane wasn’t coming home for Christmas, and so I resorted to my default setting in times of emotional distress of online panic shopping. I had almost come to the conclusion that I didn’t really like the book, then I reread a few bits prior to writing this review and decided that I did enjoy it really; I just much preferred the blog. Reading this in small chunks may be best (I read it in a few days as I had lots of reading time while snuggling a not-sleeping toddler) to heighten the enjoyment.Palazzo pants!’ I attempted to explain, as Simon huffed. ‘Well, why don’t they just SAY nice trousers then?’ I loved this book. Okay it was never ever going to improve my mind, but what it did do was make me laugh and make me laugh out loud. What do you want?’ I demanded, immediately suspicious of such compliance in the face of Simon’s well-known miserliness and loathing of the human race. Until you culminate in your now traditional Christmas Eve meltdown where you take a bottle of Baileys and the dogs and sit in the garage crying hysterically about how much you hate everyone and watching It’s a Wonderful Life on your phone until I lure you in with promises of helping you peel the potatoes while we listen to Carols from King’s, and then you talk through the whole thing without listening to it while complaining bitterly about how much you hate both our families and how ungrateful everyone is and how much you wish it was just you and me, well, usually actually you say you wish it was just you and then add me as an afterthought to be polite, either spending Christmas on a tropical beach somewhere or in a decadently luxurious country house hotel, where the roaring log fires and potato peelings are someone else’s problem and you can just waft about elegantly, drinking martinis.’

We can’t,’ I objected. What a stupid idea. What if the children unexpectedly came home and I wasn’t there? They would be left out in the snow, starving and freezing to death like the Little Matchgirl. Hallmark never made that into a Christmas film!Jane doesn’t think I’ve done anything right,’ I said sadly. ‘She called me a catastrophising control freak who always interferes. And anyway, I don’t want them to be resilient and independent at Christmas! Can’t they just do it for the rest of the year, and then at Christmas be overcome with their need for their darling mama and return to the bosom of their loving family, so we can roast chestnuts over an open fire and sing carols round the piano, and laugh and laugh and be merry?’ I DON’T KNOW! I don’t know what I’m doing. Maybe I’ll drop out of university and go from Verbier straight to Ibiza and join Persephone as a bloody shot girl.’

Well, they won’t be on Christmas Day,’ I snapped. ‘They’ll be bucolically adorable. And then you come home, cheeks a-glowing –’Rafferty. I should have expected no better from a boy called Rafferty. The very name sounds too like ‘raffish’ and therefore is untrustworthy. I rather tearfully regaled Simon with this Lost Vision over dinner and he said he was cancelling the Hallmark movies channel.