Unearthing Haunting Secrets: Erica Stern’s Frontier Blends Memoir and Ghost Story in Chilling Harmony
When Stern’s son, Jonah, is born via forceps, he experiences complications. Just why and what can be done? Stern explores these questions and so much more, from a theological Jewish standpoint, the Biblical myth of Jonah and the whale, while taking a cerebral and incisive journalistic approach to the all too universal experience of motherhood.
Stern leads the reader through the fraught history of birth from the Victorian-era sedation through the Natural Childbirth Movement, and modern-day Labor & Delivery Suites (‘How do we reserve the corner suite with the lakeview?’ Really. It’s all there), and the harrowing truth that not all babies—or mothers—make it, even in this day of modern medicine. Stern’s Frontier is a viscerally important read connecting generations of mothers and writers from the past to today.
