Heather Has Two Mommies by Lesléa Newman

There was good reason for all the apprehension. “There was one publisher who said something like, ‘I know there is a need for this book, but I wouldn’t touch it with a 10-foot pole,’” Newman told me. themes, including “ Sparkle Boy,” “ Mommy, Mama, and Me” and “ Daddy, Papa, and Me,” received 50 rejections before a friend who operated a desktop publishing company agreed to publish “Heather” with financial assistance from Newman and funds raised by friends. Newman, who’s since written several other children’s books with L.G.B.T.Q. To a modern reader, the book will seem benign and quaint, however it was anything but when it hit bookshelves in 1989. With the guidance of a highly evolved teacher, she quickly adjusts to the realization that all families are different, and the only thing that matters about a family is that “the people in it love each other.” The upper-middle-class couple - who live in a beautiful house complete with two pets, tall grass and an apple tree in the front yard - takes Heather to her first day of school, where she soon realizes she doesn’t have a daddy. The book, now in its 30th year of publication, tells the story of a little girl named Heather who lives with her two mommies, Mama Kate, a doctor, and Mama Jane, a carpenter. At the time, I threw the gag gift on a bookshelf to gather dust, only to realize later how valuable its lessons would be for my family. Three years ago, when my daughter Marty was born, a queer friend gave me and my spouse a copy of Lesléa Newman’s iconic lesbian children’s book, “ Heather Has Two Mommies.” It was meant as a joke about how heteronormative I’d become, getting married and having a child after years of firmly identifying as queer and aspiring to a life that challenges the norm. This story was originally published on Jin NYT Parenting.

Heather Has Two Mommies by Lesléa Newman