All in all, this novel *is* a what-if. It says nothing more than what I already believe, that women should not have to suffer, either economically or legally or socially, for the desire NOT to be saddled with a real and true burden. Not unless they're able and willing to take care of said burden. She did not leave behind money or property or a book or a child, but her corpse kept alive creatures who, in turn, kept other creatures alive. Into other bodies she went, but also other brains." - There are multiple ways our legacy lives on, not just through the passing of genes. I had one question - the partner of The Mender, is he known as a different name to someone else? He was the only one I hadn't connected up. I thought maybe I missed something. I liked the characters. The majority of these women were interesting, and it held my curiosity. However, I do think the setting of the story could have been better. For instance, it could have been set in the present day. There are so many people that are physically unable to have children naturally and who are also turned away from adopting any children. And, there is still a terrible stigma present, if a woman of a certain religion, or social group, wishes to get an abortion.

It didn't make me more empathetic towards anyone I wasn't already empathetic towards. If you have negative feelings coming into the book, you'll probably have a negative feeling at the end. It works more as a call to action. It made me more aware of my own "splinters of glass" that distort my perspective. Four women navigate a world where reproductive rights are being chipped away. Their options are beginning to run out, both biologically and legally Two years ago the US Congress ratified the Personhood Amendment, which gives the constitutional right to life, liberty and property to a fertilised egg at the moment of conception. Abortion is now legal in all fifty states. Abortion is now illegal in all fifty states. Abortion providers can be charged with second degree murder, abortion seekers with conspiracy to commit murder. In vitro fertilisation is …federally banned …. So I found it very useful to read in detail what the author said about this aspect of the book, which also brings out the autobiographical elements of the book:THE MENDER (Gin) - A natural healer who's confronted with an interesting dilemma. Gin gave a baby up for adoption when she was a teen, but never lost her curiosity about the child. Her practices in the old ways make her a source of suspicion and she becomes the victim of a modern-day witch hunt. Fourthly by the wide (perhaps too wide) range of influences and ideas the author brings to the book.

THE BIOGRAPHER (Ro) - A forty-two-year-old high school teacher who desperately wants a child but her time is running out thinks to her own body and the government. Why could I stand to see the whales killed, but not the lambs?" - What makes us value one form of life over another? This question is interesting from many several angles and extends beyond the issue of reproductive rights. Leni Zumas’s fierce, well-formed, hilarious, and blisteringly intelligent novel [is] squarely a piece of Trump-era art."On January fifteenth—in less than three months—this law, also known as Every Child Needs Two, takes effect. Its mission: to restore dignity, strength, and prosperity to American families. Unmarried persons will be legally prohibited from adopting children. In addition to valid marriage licenses, all adoptions will require approval through a federally regulated agency, rendering private transactions criminal. (c) In addition Canada has agreed to the Pink Wall – and actively tries to seek out and detain Americans seeking abortions (including carrying out pregnancy tests on unaccompanied minors) Oh, gosh. I'm probably the most inattentive person in the world. NOW I get what is depicted on the cover. Ughhhhhh! What for, people? Why do we need to see stylised female parts on a book cover? There some deep motivation behind it? Half the population have these parts. Do men get to publish books with their parts on the cover? (*just an afterthought*) Mattie/The Daughter – herself adopted – is a promising student at the school but her future is threatened by an unplanned pregnancy – something particularly haunting as her previous best friend is in a correctional facility having self-administered an abortion. Susan – is a mother of two, once a promising legal student she gave up her career for marriage and children, her under-motivated husband uses his only skills (natural French speaker) to scrape a salary as a French teacher while the two live rent free in Susan’s childhood home. Gin/The Mender – lives on the edge of town, living naturally and providing herbal remedies to women which she barters for supplies – her recent relationship with the headmaster’s wife has ended with the latter having a severe fall – and she faces trial for drugging the wife. Disintegration and Reintegration: much of Gin’s medicine is harvested from the unburied body of the woman who raised her; when Eivør dies a passage of Ro’s biography speculates on how her body re-entered the food chain.

I went to find this book review for a news article link, but the entire review had been wiped! Maybe it was too long? I pieced it together again from Netgalley and a draft with quotes. I'm going to try to put my link section in the comments instead) The cleverness of Zumas’s narrative structure is that it allows readers to understand the characters both from their own perspective and as they exist in the minds of others. Their names are introduced late into their stories; until then, Zumas refers to them as “The Biographer” (Ro), “The Daughter” (Mattie), “The Mender” (Gin), and “The Wife” (Susan), in a nod to the singular categories women can be shoehorned into. Gin is revealed as a woman who loves to fix people and animals, a person with kind instincts who feels things deeply, not least of which is the impulse to isolate herself. It’s only when she’s seen by other characters that she becomes an outcast, a hermit whom the local fishermen suspect of witchcraft. Similarly, Susan and Ro judge each other’s lifestyles and choices, making presumptions that are soon challenged by the other’s narration. Her husband stomps in, lifts the dustcover, sets the needle on the record, unleashes a bouncy guitar.Dirt and decay: Susan is obsessed with a plastic bag she sees which she thinks might be a dying animal; when Susan has her final argument with her husband she falls to the floor and eats dirt; her husband is obsessed with (but not prepared to contribute to) cleaning hairs from the toilet I had heard about this novel as part of the speculation leading up to the 2018 Women’s Prize – and was surprised not to see it longlisted. My perception was that it was a dystopian and political novel – very much in the spirit of The Handmaid's Tale (or The Power). But… while this has a powerful message, and occasionally beautiful writing, connecting to the characters and the story wasn’t always easy. This wasn’t so much an “enjoyable” read as one I appreciated the reminder of the ultimate cost of complacency. The unnamed character thing seemed unnecessary. It reminded me of Annihilation - four women characters, all unnamed (I can hear the conversation now: "Hey! Instead of a BIOLOGIST, let's have your main character be a BIOGRAPHER!") and I really hope having a bunch of unnamed women characters is not going to become a trend in near-future dystopian lit. And actually, the characters did have names, but only sometimes were they referred to by them - which caused me confusion when suddenly someone was "Susan" and I was like "Susan? Who?" There must be some symbolism here that I'm missing as to why they were referred to by name at some parts but not others, but I can't figure it out. Mainly, we follow these women through vignettes of their lives, as they grapple with difficult choices based on their gender, or sexuality.