All The Other Mothers Hate Me – Sarah Harman

“The missing boy is 10-year-old Alfie Risby, and to be perfectly honest with you, he’s a little shit.”

Florence Grimes, age thirty-one, always takes the easy way out.

Single, broke and unfulfilled after the humiliating end to her girl-band career, she has only one reason to get out of bed each day: her ten-year-old son Dylan. But then Alfie Risby, her son’s bully and the heir to a vast frozen-food empire, mysteriously vanishes during a class trip, and Dylan becomes the prime suspect.

Florence, for once, is faced with a task she can’t quit: She’s got to find Alfie and clear her son’s name or risk losing Dylan forever—never mind that she has no useful skills (let alone investigative ones) and that all the other school moms hate her.

Oh, and she has a reason to suspect Dylan might not be as innocent as she’d like to believe.

Book info: 320 pages. Publisher: Fourth Estate. Publication date: 10 April 2025

My Thoughts:

I saw this book being recommended on Instagram and even though I have over 2000 unread books on my kindle, my FOMO kicked in and I knew I NEEDED to read it NEXT.

Just from the blurb above I knew this would be a light-hearted fun escape from my usual dark and disturbing thrillers, just what I needed!

The main character is Florence. Originally from America, she’s now living in London with her 10 year old son, Dylan. She was “almost famous” when she was a teenager with a girl band as the lead singer, but due to a “little misunderstanding” she was very publicly DUMPED from the group.

Now she spends her days doing absolutely nothing. Watching TV, having her nails done and the occasional shoplifting trip.

Dylan attends a very posh and expensive private boys school, paid for by his father. Florence doesn’t exactly “fit in” with the posh yummy-mummies at the school gate, in fact due to another “little misunderstanding” all the other mothers hate her.

When one of Dylan’s classmates, Alfie Risby goes missing on a school trip AND Dylan was the last person to see Alfie AND Dylan has Alfie’s backpack AND Alfie was bullying Dylan, Florence fears the worst.

Could her perfect, angelic, but socially awkward son done something awful? Determined to prove her son’s innocence and to find Alfie, Florence turns Private Detective with the help of a new school mum and her only friend.

Florence is not someone I could initially warm to. She’s chaotic and selfish. She’s irresponsible and her parenting skills are somewhat lacking! However, she is funny and absolutely utterly devoted to her son Dylan. She’s also lonely, flawed and very vulnerable, but once you get to know her, she starts to get under your skin.

All the Other Mothers Hate Me is a wonderful escape from reality in the dark winter months. It’s funny and ridiculous, moving and emotional and I am very glad I read it.

Rating: 4 out of 5.