Washington • Police came to Kim Brooks' parents' door in suburban Richmond, Virginia, demanding that her mother say where her daughter was or be arrested for obstructing justice. So began a Kafkaesque two-year ordeal that plunged Brooks into reflections about current parenting practices. It also produced a book, “Small Animals: Parenthood in the Age of Fear,” that is a catalogue of symptoms of America’s descent into unfocused furiousness.
On a mild day, rushing to catch a plane home to Chicago, she darted into a Virginia Target to make a purchase, leaving her 4-year-old son in the locked car with a window slightly open.