Under the Spreading Chestnut Tree

by Hilary Smith

The year is 2102: due to widespread use of sex-bots men and women live solitary lives of sterile pleasure. In this new world people's bodies and minds are tightly regulated; hormones are manipulated starting from childhood and most media is banned or has been abolished. Babies are conceived from eggs and sperm that are prescreened for all known genetic disorders, furthermore infectious disease is virtually eradicated. Scientists and engineers can re-create every body part and organ except the elusive womb. Women are still required for procreation but motherhood is also tightly regulated, a privilege and not a right.

Hannah is a "natural", as in a naturally conceived human being; her parents risked so much to fulfill their dream. Hannah loves her mother and cherishes memories of her father yet mildly resents her heritage as all her life she has been a social outcast. Laura, Hannah's mother, reminisces about romance while Hannah is more realistic. They both crave a child. Hannah is willing to go through the humiliating tests and painful procedures and to pay unexpected costs. She unwittingly involves herself in gruesome experiments and secret government programs. Yet it's too late when she realizes just how much she had to sacrifice.

321 pages, Kindle Edition

Published May 24, 2018