What are you reading in 2023?

[rosarugosa]

I finished The Unexpected Mother by Susan Ring. It is a true story about the author’s experiences as a surrogate mother while living in California.

Her first surrogate experience was for a couple she didn’t especially like, but that experience went smoothly. When the baby was six months old they wanted her to start another pregnancy for them, this time, twins. Her instinct told her these were not nice people, but she went ahead and did it. It all went wrong.

First thing to go wrong: against doctors recommendations they had him implant three embryos, thinking that it would be unlikely three would survive. Three DID survive. She had to have a “selective reduction “i.e. abortion at 14 weeks, and that experience haunted her.

And then much to her horror at around 30 weeks, the couple told her they didn’t want the babies after all. They were getting a divorce. The woman in the pair was not biologically involved. The father had donated and his sperm, so the twins were legally his.

The father was found to be bipolar and unable to take care of himself, and he did not want the children then, but after they were born, he had the expectation that eventually he would get them. He wanted them to go into the care of child protective services. These two babies were perfectly healthy.

The Surrogate mother was horrified by this and court actions took place. Long story short, she got full legal rights to the twins. She chose a nice young couple to be their parents, and at three months of age the twins left her home to live with their permanent parents.

this book showed one way out of many that surrogacy can go wrong. However, the author went on to be a surrogate parent at least three more times. she liked being pregnant and bringing life into being.

Wow, I think I can relate more to the alien from outer space in my most recent read (Project Hail Mary), than I can to this serial surrogate. Sounds like an interesting read though.

[happystuff]

There had been a waiting list at the library, but I finally got Regrow Your Veggies by Melissa Raupauch. I've already been doing this with my celery and romaine lettuce, but want to see what more there is.

[rosarugosa]

These were my July reads:
Nomadland by Jessica Bruder - I think the movie if not the book has been discussed here. It was an interesting read. It's frightening to think of all those seniors living so precariously, some in their cars, and working such awful jobs (e.g. Amazon warehouse jobs).
Ordinary Grace by William Kent Krueger - excellent read about a boy in a small town and life, love, murder, all that messy human stuff in the hands of a skilled writer.
Project Hail Mary by Andy Weir - this is the guy who wrote The Martian, which I did not read but I really enjoyed the movie. I absolutely loved this book! I wouldn't say SciFi is a favorite genre of mine, but I don't think you have to particularly dig SciFi to enjoy this book (kind of like you can enjoy Lonesome Dove even if you aren't a fan of Westerns).
A Boy and his Dog at the End of the World by C. A. Fletcher - a decent read about a post-apocalyptic world, with an interesting premise on how mankind died out.
When the Emperor was Divine by Julie Otsuka - a brief but good book about the incarceration of Japanese-Americans during WW2. It was starkly evocative without being wordy.

[KayLR]

Re-reading one of my old favorites, "Animal Dreams," by Barbara Kingsolver.

[dado potato]

Jeff Goodell, The Heat Will Kill You First.

Goes into the subject of human diseases that are aggravated by hot weather. Urban planners have taken some measures here and there, so it is not entirely a story of gloom and doom.

[pinkytoe]

I have a slight fascination with reading about religious cults/groups so working on two books now based on real life - Forager and When the World Didn't End. It just amazes me how people can so easily be led down that path or any path by a charismatic leader.

[ApatheticNoMore]

I am reading a climate change policy/economics book called "Alligators in the arctic and how to avoid them". It probably goes without saying that books like that are dense and not really pleasure reading, but I wanted to read it.

[JaneV2.0]

I am reading a climate change policy/economics book called "Alligators in the arctic and how to avoid them". It probably goes without saying that books like that are dense and not really pleasure reading, but I wanted to read it.

I have a tendency to select either meaty non-fiction I have to slog through, or airy fiction I could read at a sitting.

[Yppej]

We Were Once a Family about the two women who drove off a cliff killing themselves and their six children

[JaneV2.0]

We Were Once a Family about the two women who drove off a cliff killing themselves and their six children

That must be a story.