YMMV / Mother of the Year

• And You Thought It Would Fail: When the story was first announced, response was fairly negative, partly because it's yet another genderlocked book but mainly because players were worried it wouldn't address the issues revolving around single motherhood properly. However, many were pleasantly surprised, finding the writing solid, the interactions between Tara and Zoey heartwarming and enjoyable, the challenges of single motherhood properly addressed since the beginning, and main and supporting characters alike having compelling stories to tell.
• Broken Base:
  • When the story was first announced, players began debating why it's "Mother of the Year" instead of "Parent of the Year". One side thinks it's fine as is because the challenges single mothers experience are very different from those of single fathers, and that the writers are better able to tell a quality story if they commit to a specific viewpoint rather than tell a generic story about single parenthood. The other side thinks Pixelberry could have allowed players to choose to play as male instead of being forced to play as a female yet again because doing so ignores the challenges single fathers experience.
  • The appearance options for the main character have sparked a big debate. Many players cringed because it makes the fifth time this particular set of faces has been used in just a few months (the first four being Open Heart, Platinum, Sunkissed, and Bachelorette Party; all of these except Open Heart were still updating at the time of this book's release). Some players complained that it was a sign of laziness and declining quality on Pixelberry's part, and stated that they wouldn't play the story simply because of it. Others argued that while the recycling was indeed annoying, it wasn't a valid reason not to play the story because the artwork should have no bearing on the quality of writing.
• Catharsis Factor:
  • The book offers two Premium options to let Tara give "The Reason You Suck" Speech to Vanessa, and reproach her for her bad influence on August, her lack of empathy as a fellow single mother, and all the bullying Tara had to endure from her and the PTA. A lot of players bought both of them immediately.
  • There is also a premium option in one chapter to play as Zoey and stand up to August, which many players eagerly picked.
  • During the court scene, Alma offers Tara the chance to get the store’s security footage to prove Tallulah is lying, which a lot of readers took. During Science Fair, Tallulah gets hit by a Laser-Guided Karma, since she never showed any regrets for what she did to Tara.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Despite minimal screentime and her relationship with Guy, Faye is very popular with the fans because of her positive attitude and friendliness toward Tara, as well as showing a genuine interest in Zoey's happiness.
  • Alma is also very popular with the fanbase for being a loyal and supportive friend to Tara. And by "supportive", we're talking "willing to commit crimes for her" level of support.
  • Cynthia is also liked by fans for being the only member of the PTA to treat Tara respectfully, and for not being involved in the movement to have Eiko fired.
• Fan-Preferred Couple:
  • Alma/Tara is a fairly common ship and a lot of people want her to be a love interest.
  • A number of readers want the option to date/hook up with Faye after breaking her and Guy up.
• Foe Yay Shipping: A lot of people wanted Vanessa to be a love interest early on. Now that she has firmly cemented her status as an irredeemable Hate Sink, cue the Abandon Shipping - but some still want an option to hook up with/"hate bang" her.
• Love to Hate: Many consider Vanessa and Guy some of the most loathsome characters Pixelberry have created because of their relentless efforts in making Tara's life as miserable as possible.
• Memetic Mutation: With the mother and daughter's last name of Day being unable to be changed by the player, many players give one or both of them first names which combine with Day to form puns. (e.g. Sunny, Independence, Sunshine, Christmas.)
• Moral Event Horizon: Chapter 11 has Vanessa crossing it by not only needling Tara to drop her case and settle into letting Guy have custody of Zoey, especially when Tara's lawyer is at the same gathering, but when Eiko calls her out on all of her and her family's Karma Houdini antics through the book, Vanessa outing Eiko's homosexuality is this in and out of universe that a lot of people took the option to slap her across the face.
• No Yay: There were quite a few fans who were turned off by romancing Eiko, considering a relationship between a teacher and the parent of a student completely inappropriate.
• The Scrappy:
  • Tallulah. Unlike Vanessa and Guy (who get more layers if Tara confronts them in premium scenes), she comes off as a Flat Character with an irrational hatred for Tara, to the point she agrees to frame Tara to get her fired, and is willing to lie in court just to get at her, and even after everything, she doesn’t try to make amends with Tara. Many immediately took the chance to expose her lies.
  • Sally is widely disliked for her handling of the situation when Tara is framed for shoplifting. She fires Tara on the spot without any sort of investigation and refuses to pull security footage from the day in question because it would require her to file an incident report (the player can only obtain the footage in a premium choice by having Alma threaten to quit).
• Toy Ship: Zoey admits that AJ isn’t bad like August when talking about the twins. She gets some Ship Tease with AJ if she gets the premium option to stand up to August, after AJ defends her as well, and the bonus scene after completing the board, showing that they genuinely become friends afterwards.