Zara Rahman's essay asks why mothers are still fighting the clock

It's About Time tackles a widely experienced reality for mothers: the daily fight with time  

Zara Rahman’s essay It’s About Time: Motherhood’s Most Precious and Contested Resource has published in all key formats.  

It’s About Time draws on examples that consider the status quo’s cost to mothers and children. And it challenges us to acknowledge that there are other ways. If we’re willing to change. 

Speaking about the essay ahead of its launch, Rahman said she was moved to write it in part out of frustration.  

“The expectation on mothers in Europe, in North America is that the more time you spend with your kids the better outcome these children will have. It really puts this pressure on you as a mother,” Rahman said. “We have so little empathy for the trade-offs and decisions that mothers have to make.” 

The essay, which includes original reporting, examines alternatives to how society currently approaches motherhood. 

“It can be really hard to zoom out and think “what else is out there?” Rahman said. “This book is a way for me to explore what those alternatives are. And the essay is small enough that you can definitely read it in one nap time!” 

The 64-page essay has been described by Afua Hirsch as “a must-read for everyone who cares about understanding how we have got this so wrong, and how we can imagine a better future,” while Angela Saini called it “a short but mighty meditation on the need to lift the weight of expectation from mothers and spread childcare and housework more evenly across society as a whole.” 

It’s About Time by Rahman is the first of three titles published as part of a partnership between Full Set and global newsroom Fuller. 

Rahman is a British-Bangladeshi author, researcher and non-profit executive whose debut book, Machine Readable Me: The Hidden Ways Tech Shapes Our Identities, was published by award-winning Scottish independent publisher 404 Ink in 2023. 

Buy the paperback edition of It's About Time directly from Full Set on the publisher's official site.