This is the story of missing my mother. One day, in a way unique to you, it will be your story, too. So begins Missing Mom, Joyce Carol Oates’ personal and candid novel.

Nikki Eaton, a single, thiry-one-year-old, sexually liberated and economically self-supporting young woman, never particularly thought of herself as a daughter. Yet following the unexpected loss of her mother, her identity is transformed during the course of a tumultuous year of mourning that brings sorrow, illumination, wisdom, and even-from an unexpected source-a nurturing love.