Monitor’s book editor, Marjorie Kehe wrote that “admirers of Angelou’s now-classic memoir, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings will delight in this sequel. Her memoir is both a tender read and a lovely tribute to the special gifts that only a mother can bring,” Kehe wrote.
Boston Globe’s, Carmela Ciuraru agreed that writing “page by page, Angelou’s story is astonishing. There is a slightly frustrating lack of chronology in this book and several odd lacunae in the narrative – but life is messy and so is memory,” she wrote. “What matters is that ‘Mom & Me & Mom’ is a superb account of reconciliation, forgiveness, and survival.”
Fiona Sturges, a writer for The Independent, was also impressed. Mom & Me & Mom is a profoundly moving tale of separation and reunion, and an ultimately optimistic portrait of the maternal bond,” she wrote.
However, Bernardine Evaristo, of The Observer compared and found contradictions in details between Caged Bird and Mom & Me & Mom distracting.“Memory, it seems, is a fickle, fictional, fantastical thing,” Evaristo wrote of differences in Angelou’s portrayal of her mother in the two books. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings was a ground-breaking triumph. Mom & Me & Mom does a good job of undermining it.”
