The author of In My Mother's House reflects on a spiritual and political awakening that connects her to her father "in this affecting and intimate memoir" ( Publishers Weekly ). For years, author and psychoanalyst Kim Chernin thought her Marxist firebrand mother was her role model. As she enters midlife, however, Chernin finds that her father's gentle manner has profoundly influenced her. While her mother taught her to change the world through bold action, her father sought to make things happen in small ways. Now Chernin finds herself drawn to recollections of her father quietly working in his garden, which was, she now realizes, a sanctuary and a school. Through three personal stories, Chernin explores her own spiritual evolution. Whether she is comforting a dying woman or seeking wisdom from a Hindu holy woman, she keeps returning to the image of her father in his garden. All the while, Chernin tackles the questions that pull at all of us: how to make sense in a world whose order isn't always apparent, and how to find balance between the mind and the spirit.