Welcome to my online community. Instead of wine or coffee, I’m serving stories—the kind women tell among friends.
They’re drawn from my life and other lives that have inspired me. I’m lucky enough to have spent my career exchanging stories with women. At Chatelaine, where I spent a decade as Editor, I shared my defining moments in a monthly column. Thousands of readers identified. They taught me how much we have in common—and how much we have to learn from one another.
The conversation continues right here. You'll learn about my new memoir, My Mother's Daughter, which Chatelaine readers encouraged me to write. You can read and comment on some of my most popular articles. You can post a story in honour of your own mother-or your daughter. And you can follow my blog, Letters from Rona. Now over to you.
Credits: Photo © Jonathan Sprague; hair, JC Salons
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Rona Maynard is an author, speaker and former Editor of Chatelaine. Everything she knows about the real lives of women, she learned from women like you.
From the book:
I said to my father, "You don't live here anymore. This is my mother's house, not yours. It's time for you to go." My father cursed me. He shook his fist. Then he left and never came back.

My 50 years with Robert Frost
Mrs. Wilcox had been teaching in Durham, New Hampshire for as long as anyone could remember when I landed in her eighth-grade English class. She had a cap of tight gray curls, a queenly smile and one of those imposing silhouettes that hint of a close encounter between a full figure and a corset. She didn't take any lip from smart alecks but she had a soft spot--and a spring lunch of crustless tea sandwiches--for those of us who helped out in the school library. I liked her in the tolerant, offhand way that I liked certain well-meaning relatives who didn't have a clue how it felt to be 13. What I couldn't bear was her taste in poetry--or, as she pronounced it, "poytry." [more]
January 23, 2013
Enroll now! Memoir workshops with Rona Maynard coming up
[more]
January 3, 2013
When employees break down: Rona Maynard to speak at HRPA 2013
[more]
April 23, 2012
Rona Maynard to speak on overcoming depression at Cobourg fundraiser
[more]
This is your space for celebrating your mother—or your daughter. If not for her, you’d be a different person. Share a story, post a photo and find out what other women have to say about the women who shaped their lives.
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Patricia Lily Connors
My mum only left me 4 days ago so it's all very raw and surreal. There are moments of disbelief and then waves of grief, scared that I will forget her voice...
[More]
Patricia Gail Lewellen
For My Beautiful Mom....
Patricia Gail Born April 7th 1951- Passed Away Dec 11th 2011
I awoke this morning at 4am the same time you left, how coincidental..I said to myself,.. This time will never...
[More]
Ursula
My mother passed away almost nine years ago now. When I do the math I am almost in disbelief. Nine years ALREADY? ONLY nine years? Depending on where I'm at in my head...
[More]
Thank you for this article Rona. I too, in desperation googled about a best friend dying and your page came up. Now I don't feel so weird. I've had grandparents die and some older family die but this time it really hit me hard. Naoko was my treasured friend. The funny... [more]
Written by Corrie, October 04, 2012
OCT
08
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