A precocious child actress known for the late 1970s TV series “Family,” and her Oscar-nominated role as Marsha Mason’s daughter in The Goodbye Girl, Quinn Cummings is today a mother, businesswoman (creator of the Hiphugger baby carrier) and blogger. Her “QC Report” has snared national ink and is the springboard for a breezy first book. Part memoir, part mom-ish ruminations, Notes from the Underwire: Adventures from My Awkward and Lovely Life is also salted by an ample dose of wry.
Cummings, who lives in Los Angeles with her baby daddy (whom she refers to in the text as Consort) and their daughter, tackles subjects such as the family dog(s), injuries sustained during gymnastics lessons and negotiating the minefield wrought when little Alice asks how a classmate can have two mommies. Unafraid to be sarcastic or reveal her uncertainties, Cummings dips into lessons learned as a show biz survivor. Though she’ll be saddled with the “former child star” label in perpetuity, she also spent two years as a talent agent. Milking her background in self-deprecating style, she riffs on L.A.’s obsession with looks (“an eye lift at thirty-three doesn’t make you look twenty-three, it makes you look alarmed”), fashion, mansions and more. She visited one lavish house where the daughters’ bedrooms were in a separate wing. That’s one way to create a family of strangers, notes Cummings, who much prefers her family’s more modest abode—and close proximity to motherhood. Which means readers can anticipate a sequel.
