"How to Beat Your Kids without Leaving a Mark" is a testament to the most thankless job in the world-raising children as a single mom. Author Liz M. Mendoza draws on her experiences as a single mother to share the nitty-gritty details of modern motherhood, from the good to the bad to the ugly, and everything in between. She explains how the birth of a child changes your life in more ways than you can ever imagine. Old desires and concerns are replaced by one all-consuming struggle to protect and nurture. Life soon becomes an endless string of sleepless nights, anxiety-filled days, and broken hearts, punctuated by rare fleeting moments of bliss. Ultimately, in her experience, parenthood becomes a contest of wills between mother and child; it was during this always-smoldering battle for supremacy where Mendoza learned how, through guile and cunning, to always stay one step ahead of her son: where she learned how to beat her son without leaving a mark.