I’m really glad that I wrote Alice and the Warden.
Since I’m expecting #6, I’ve been ravenously hungry for stories about pregnancy and babies. Heck, I even watched Bridget Jones’s Baby, even though I don’t remotely care for the subgenre.
Unfortunately, the majority of stories love to revolve around the “pregnancy is shameful and/or dangerous!” trope. Either female characters are moaning about how their life is over, or it literally comes close to ending because of some pregnancy related complication.
Aaaand it doesn’t stop there. After the baby is born, there’s the constant complaining about how a helpless human needs someone to care for it — as if being depended on is the worst thing that can happen. “Woe is me! I can’t be selfish all the time anymore!”
It’s so sickening.
Especially because I know women who are like that in real life.
Me? I’m the sort of person that wears jewelry that depicts pregnancy. I firmly believe in honoring the Divine Feminine, and rant about how our Christian-normative society demonizes the most powerful magic women possess: the ability to create new life. Not everyone thinks that the very existence of humanity is something shameful.
While the homebirthing community has plenty of women similar to me, none of them are writing novels. Too many of them have gone off-grid, I guess.
I’ve spent the last several months trying to find decent stories about pregnancy and babies, but now I’ve given up. I’m reading my own novel.
Alice is so sweet and loves her family so much, it’s like a breath of fresh air. Finally, a character who is full of hope and doesn’t hate everything about life.
In a very literal sense, I wrote that novel for myself.
Thank you for sharing my work!
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