When her son is in trouble, a heartbroken mother finds the courage and faith to save him, in ReShonda Tate Billingsley’s powerful family drama—a novel as timely as today’s headlines. The breaking TV news rocks Jasper, Texas, to the core: a white police officer is fatally shot in a scuffle with three black youths—and a cellphone video captures Jamal Jones, the sixteen-year-old son of esteemed Reverend Elton Jones, escalating the tragic encounter. Now, as the national spotlight shines on a town already rife with racial tension, Jamal is a murder suspect on the run. And all of Jasper—even the Reverend’s congregation—rushes to judge the boy they thought they knew. But Gloria Jones knows her son best, and she races to find Jamal before the law does—to the outrage of her workaholic husband. Once she finds him, she has to decide whether to turn him in or help him run. With ruthless prosecutor and Houston mayoral candidate Kay Christensen hungering to put another young thug behind bars, Gloria will face her biggest battle yet. And when long-hidden secrets and shocking lies come to light, throwing Jamal’s case and his destiny into a tailspin, all Gloria can do is pray that the truth—and a mother’s unconditional love—will be enough to redeem the mistakes of the past and ultimately, save her son.

This heartfelt, deeply personal memoir explores how a celebrated filmmaker and activist and his conservative Mormon mother built bridges across today’s great divides—and how our stories hold the power to heal. • Adapted as an HBO documentary now streaming on HBO Max. “A beautifully written, utterly compelling account of growing up poor and gay with a thrice married, physically disabled, deeply religious Mormon mother, and the imprint this irrepressible woman made on the character of Dustin Lance Black.” —Jon Krakauer, bestselling author of Missoula and Under the Banner of Heaven Dustin Lance Black wrote the Oscar-winning screenplay for Milk and helped overturn California’s anti–gay marriage Proposition 8, but as an LGBTQ activist he has unlikely origins—a conservative Mormon household outside San Antonio, Texas. There he was raised by a single mother who, as a survivor of childhood polio, endured brutal surgeries as well as braces and crutches for life. Despite the abuse and violence of two questionably devised Mormon marriages, she imbued Lance with her inner strength and irrepressible optimism. When Lance came out to his mother at age twenty-one, she initially derided his sexuality as a sinful choice. It may seem like theirs was a house destined to be divided—and at times it was. But in the end, they did not let their differences define them or the relationship that had inspired two remarkable lives. This heartfelt, deeply personal memoir explores how a mother and son built bridges across great cultural divides—and how our stories hold the power to heal.

Mama's Boy describes the life of author Robert Hood: his early years in a coal-mining village during the Depression, his life in the navy during World War II, and his later professional success. At the heart of Hood's memoir is his proud and talented mother, who is determined that her headstrong son will become somebody. But the impish boy is more interested in sports than poetry recitations or declamation contests. Anxious to enter the war, seventeen-year-old Hood enlists in the U.S. Navy in 1944 and serves on Guam. He returns, attends college, and eventually ends up in New York City as the editor-in-chief of Boys' Life Magazine. As Hood achieves success, he meets some of the distinguished artists and authors of the twentieth century. He lunches with Andre Kertesz, Alex Haley, and Isaac Asimov; takes tea with Salvador Dali and Philippe Halsman; and chats on the phone with Margaret Coit, Catherine Drinker Bowen, and Margaret Bourke-White. He also interviews great athletes such as Hank Greenberg, Mickey Mantle, and Willie Mays. But most important to Hood are those people in his family who mentored him so well. Mama's Boy pays tribute to his parents, grandparents, siblings, uncles, and aunt. His love for them bears witness to the endurance of human memory.

In postwar America, the discourse of Momism advanced the idea that an over-affectionate or too-distant mother hampers the social and psychosexual development of her children, in particular her sons. Deemed worst of all was the outcome of homosexuality, since the period saw an intense policing of sexual deviance. van den Oever zooms in on four instances of the cultural representation of Momism: The Grotto, by Grace Zaring Stone, Suddenly Last Summer, by Tennessee Williams, Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho, and Portnoy's Complaint, by Philip Roth, to offer new commentary on canonical texts, a particular moment in American culture, and future reading strategies.

A New York Times contributor offers a radical reexamination of a hot-button issue of the mother and son relationship and advocates the end of the "mama's boy" taboo. New York Times contributor Kate Stone Lombardi unveils the surprisingly close relationship between mothers and sons. Mother after mother confessed to Lombardi that her husband, brothers, and even female friends and family criticize the fact that she is "too close" to her sons. Many of these women are often startled by the strong connection they feel with their sons; but rarely do they talk about it because society tells them to push their little boys away and not "baby" them with too much cuddling and comforting. It is as if there were an existing playbook-based on gender preconceptions dating back to Freud, Oedipus, and beyond-that prescribes the way mothers and their sons should interact. Lombardi's much-needed narrative is the first and only book to share truly revealing interviews with mothers who have close relationships with their sons, as well as interviews with these women's sons and husbands. Lombardi persuasively argues that the rise of the new male-one who is more emotionally intelligent and more sensitive without being less "manly"-is directly attributable to women who are rejecting the "mama's boy" taboo. Highlighting new scientific studies, The Mama's Boy Myth begins a fresh story-one that will be welcomed by mothers, fathers, and sons alike.

Long before Kevin Jennings began advocating to end anti-LGBT bias in schools, he was a victim of it. In Mama's Boy, Preacher's Son, Jennings traces the roots of his activism to his elementary school days in the conservative South, where "faggot" became more familiar to him than his own name. Mama's Boy, Preacher's Son is that rare memoir that is both a riveting personal story and an inside account of a critical chapter in our recent history. Creating safe schools for all youth is now a central part of the progressive agenda in American education—and Kevin Jennings is at the forefront of that fight. Mama's Boy, Preacher's Son earned an A- in Entertainment Weekly, was featured in Salon and The Advocate, and was called "a great read" by People.

This is the true story of both tender and tough love. The message in this book will help to heal your wounds and give you hope for tomorrow.

In this compelling collection of short memoirs, gay men take on a stereotype and delve into what it means to be mommy's favorite. Through humor, insight and poignancy, the writers in this collection reclaim and rejoice in describing a special relationship that has never been examined in quite this way before. Voices from many backgrounds navigate the sometimes wonderful, sometimes treacherous, but inevitably fascinating terrain of that very special bond between mothers and their different sons. These inspired explorations of this unique relationship will help readers gain a better appreciation of themselves and come to a new meaning of the term mama's boy.

Murderer Eric Napoletano was protceted by his mother, a NYPD civilian employee.

A mother's possessive love becomes a monstrous, evil force when Stephen Jennings's dead mother reaches out from beyond the grave to "protect" her son from the women with whom Stephen becomes involved