Fig Tree snaps up Emma Barnett's 'bracingly honest book' about maternity leave

Emma Barnett’s Maternity Service: A Love Letter to Mothers from the Front Line of Maternity Leave will be published by Fig Tree next spring.

Helen Garnons-Williams, publishing director of Fig Tree, acquired UK and Commonwealth rights by the broadcaster, journalist and author from Robert Caskie at Robert Caskie Agency Ltd. Fig Tree will publish Maternity Service as a lead hardback in spring 2025.

Fig Tree said: "From the award-winning Radio 4 ‘Today Programme’ broadcaster, journalist and author, Maternity Service is a heartfelt, reassuring and bracingly honest book about the experience of being on maternity leave."

The blurb reads: "In one important sense maternity leave is a misnomer, as it involves no actual leave. You are constantly on. There is nothing restful about it. In another sense maternity leave is aptly named, although not in the way it was originally intended. It’s a period of leave from all you know: taking leave of one’s mind, body, job, and relationships.

"When Emma Barnett began her second maternity leave, she realised that despite having been there before, as soon as her first leave had finished the rose-tinted lenses descended and she immediately forgot what the experience was actually like when she was in it. This collective forgetting, which leads to well-meaning comments such as ‘enjoy every minute’ and ‘treasure this special time’ is doing a disservice to women, leaving them unprepared for the more complicated, conflicted reality of the experience."

Fig Tree added: "In Maternity Service she sets out to capture this reality, in real time.  Emma isn’t offering advice on sleep-training or weaning or helping your baby reach milestones. Instead, her book is a celebration and acknowledgement of the work of being on maternity leave, with its soaring highs and challenging lows and its impact on how women feel about themselves and their purpose."

Garnons-Williams said: "I wish I had had Emma’s book to keep me company when I was on maternity leave. Part-comfort-blanket, part-flak-jacket, it acknowledges what a complex, precious, emotionally befuddling, and all-too-often-glossed-over time maternity leave can be. It’s an eye-opening, groundbreaking and wonderfully reassuring book and we are thrilled to be publishing it at Fig Tree."

Barnett, who is based in London, said: "I wrote this book live. As my experiences were unfolding; in moments snatched while I was doing my second tour of duty in the faraway land that is maternity leave. I couldn’t believe how much of it I had forgotten from my first time.

"I wanted to capture how I felt while I still could in a bid to faithfully remember and record it—while throwing a life-line to other women who have been through it or are about to or are trench-deep. Right now. It is a love letter from me to them."

She added: "I found reframing the whole period as maternity service really helpful and if you read the book, which is deliberately short, because all mothers are knackered, I hope you will too."

Barnett is an award-winning broadcaster and journalist who wrote Period: It’s About Bloody Time which was published by HQ in 2019.

Named Interviewer of the Year at the British Journalism awards and twice best speech radio presenter by the Radio Academy, she is a presenter on BBC Radio 4’s flagship "Today Programme" and hosts TV interviews and documentaries across the BBC. Previously she was the chief presenter of "Woman’s Hour" on BBC Radio 4, and has presented "Newsnight", among other high-profile shows.

The Manchester-born journalist writes a regular newspaper column for the i newspaper and was previously a columnist for the Sunday Times and the Daily Telegraph, where she was also the women’s editor.