Celebrated Author to Speak at St. John’s About Her Ode to Mother-Daughter Relationships
Few relationships experience the ebbs and flows, highs and lows as mother-daughter relationships do. They are unique, yet tied by a common thread: the desire to love and be loved. Impossibly simple and simply impossible at the same time, mothers and daughters know you don’t have to understand it to appreciate it.
And so does author Judy Batalion, whose book White Walls: A Memoir About Motherhood, Daughterhood, and the Mess in Between has received praise since it was published in January 2016. Batalion will speak at 2 p.m. Monday, March 6, in the Wintergarden at Brickstone by St. John’s in the first of St. John’s annual Embrace Living series. She’ll talk about her experiences in creating the book by reliving memories of days long since passed.
“So many of our residents can relate to the mother-daughter experience and are eager to hear Judy share her perspective,” St. John’s Vice President of Marketing Jennifer Lesinski said. “These relationships are important at every stage of life, and Judy’s book does a phenomenal job of reminding us of that fact.”
“White Walls” is a touching mother-daughter memoir that explores the messiness of motherhood and the indelible marks that mothers and daughters make on one another’s lives. The book has been featured on the Today show, the New York Times Sunday Review, LA Review of Books, The Believer, the New York Post and The Forward.
“Told in a style that is anxiously charming, Batalion’s memoir asks what it means to both love our parents and to be free from their wreckage,” the LA Review of Books said of Batalion’s work.
The event is co-sponsored by the Louis S. Wolk Jewish Community Center of Greater Rochester in conjunction with the annual Lane Dworkin Jewish Book Festival. Tickets are available online at rjbf.org for $10 each, $8 for friends of St. John’s and for JCC members. For more information on this event, go to stjohnsliving.org/white-walls.
