"But what is a child between injured parents?" wrote Edna O'Brien, an Irish novelist.
"Only a weapon."
The arsenal, by that definition, is vast.
In America nearly a third of children will see their parents divorce before they turn 18.
The share of American children living in single-parent divorced households
is almost five times higher than it was in 1960.
In Britain nearly a quarter of children live with single parents—
though far fewer adults are divorced,
because they are more likely to have children without marrying first.
Divorce is one of the biggest social transformations of the past century.
Instead of telling human history in the way others might, selecting a famous war or revolution,
Lara Feigel, a professor at King's College London,
opts for a different sort of conflict-ridden setting: the courtroom.
"There are winners and losers here, and the child is the prize," she writes.
Ostensibly Ms Feigel's subject is "the secret history of mothers".
She uses seven subjects, from Caroline Norton to Britney Spears,
to show how women helped forge new laws and shape attitudes
concerning the right to parent after marital dissolution.
In fact, she writes about eight women, including herself.
During the pandemic Ms Feigel moved to the English countryside