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Experiments in Motherhood and Technology
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Hatching
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Narrated by:
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Jenni Quilter
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By:
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Jenni Quilter
About this listen
A provocative examination of reproductive technologies that questions our understanding of fertility, motherhood, and the female body
Since the world’s first test-tube baby was born in 1978, in vitro fertilization has made the unimaginable possible for millions of people, but its revolutionary potential remains unrealized. Today, fertility centers continue to reinforce conservative norms of motherhood and family, and infertility remains a deeply emotional experience many women are reluctant to discuss.
In this vivid and incisive personal and cultural history, Jenni Quilter explores what it is like to be one of those women, both the site of a bold experiment and a potential mother caught between fearing and yearning. Quilter observes her own experience with the eye of a critic, recounting the pleasures and pains of objectification: how medicine mediates between women and their bodies, how marketing redefines pregnancy and early parenthood as a set of products, how we celebrate the “natural” and denigrate the artificial.
With nuance, empathy, and a fierce intellect, Quilter asks urgent questions about what it means to desire a child and how much freedom reproductive technologies actually offer. Her writing embraces the complexities of motherhood and the humanity of IVF: the waiting rooms, the message boards, and the genetic permutations of what a thoroughly modern family might mean.
©2022 Jenni Quilter (P)2022 Penguin AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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- Narrated by: Siho Ellsmore
- Length: 10 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 158
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 133
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 131
The Latin term for the female genitalia, pudendum, means “parts for which you should be ashamed”. Until 1651, ovaries were called female testicles. The fallopian tubes are named for a man. Named, claimed, and shamed: Welcome to the story of the female body, as penned by men. Today, a new generation of (mostly) women scientists is finally redrawing the map. With modern tools and fresh perspectives, they’re looking at the organs traditionally bound up in reproduction—the uterus, ovaries, vagina—and seeing within them a new biology of change and resilience.
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3 out of 5 stars
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poor narration
- By Jane on 08-23-22
By: Rachel E. Gross
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Birth Day
- A Pediatrician Explores the Science, the History, and the Wonder of Childbirth
- By: Mark Sloan MD
- Narrated by: Mark Sloan MD
- Length: 9 hrs and 55 mins
- Abridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 36
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 28
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Story5 out of 5 stars 27
"I delivered twenty babies in the summer of 1977. I was hardly more than a baby myself, just turned 24 and starting my third year of medical school." So began Mark Sloan's three-decades-long exploration of the wonders and oddities of human childbirth. Pediatrician, husband, and father, the author has attended nearly 3000 births since that long-ago summer, encountering everything from routine deliveries to tense labor-room dramas.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Great Book - Heavy on the History
- By Robert Ingalls on 03-16-17
By: Mark Sloan MD
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The Undying
- Pain, Vulnerability, Mortality, Medicine, Art, Dreams, Data, Exhaustion, Cancer, and Care
- By: Anne Boyer
- Narrated by: Amy Finegan
- Length: 5 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 56
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 49
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Story4 out of 5 stars 49
A week after her 41st birthday, the acclaimed poet Anne Boyer was diagnosed with highly aggressive triple-negative breast cancer. For a single mother living paycheck to paycheck who had always been the caregiver, the catastrophic illness was both a crisis and an initiation into new ideas about mortality and the gendered politics of illness. The Undying explores the experience of illness as mediated by digital screens, weaving in ancient Roman dream diarists, cancer hoaxers and fetishists, cancer vloggers, pro-pain "dolorists", and the many little murders of capitalism.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Provocative and moving
- By C. FREEMAN on 05-13-20
By: Anne Boyer
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Birth
- The Surprising History of How We Are Born
- By: Tina Cassidy
- Narrated by: Angela Starling
- Length: 9 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 129
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 110
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 110
From evolution to the epidural and beyond, Tina Cassidy presents an intelligent, enlightening, and impeccably researched cultural history of how and why we're born the way we are. Women have been giving birth for millennia, but that's about the only constant in the final stage of the great process that is human reproduction. Why is it that every culture and generation seems to have its own ideas about the best way to give birth?
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4 out of 5 stars
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important historical work, fascinating and fun
- By RT on 02-24-16
By: Tina Cassidy
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Smile
- The Story of a Face
- By: Sarah Ruhl
- Narrated by: Sarah Ruhl
- Length: 6 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 111
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 98
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 98
With a play opening on Broadway, and every reason to smile, Sarah Ruhl has just survived a high-risk pregnancy when she discovers the left side of her face is completely paralyzed. She is assured that 90 percent of Bell’s palsy patients experience a full recovery—like Ruhl’s own mother. But Sarah is in the unlucky ten percent. And for a woman, wife, mother, and artist working in theater, the paralysis and the disconnect between the interior and exterior brings significant and specific challenges.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Synkinesis: I am there
- By Elizabeth Principi on 11-04-21
By: Sarah Ruhl
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Everything in Its Place
- First Loves and Last Tales
- By: Oliver Sacks
- Narrated by: Dan Woren
- Length: 8 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 157
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 140
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 139
From the best-selling author of Gratitude and On the Move, a final volume of essays that showcase Sacks's broad range of interests - from his passion for ferns, swimming, and horsetails, to his final case histories exploring schizophrenia, dementia, and Alzheimer's.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Missing Sacks
- By Brandy on 12-02-19
By: Oliver Sacks
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When Breath Becomes Air
- By: Paul Kalanithi, Abraham Verghese - foreword
- Narrated by: Sunil Malhotra, Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 5 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 29,271
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 25,697
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 25,631
At the age of thirty-six, on the verge of completing a decade’s worth of training as a neurosurgeon, Paul Kalanithi was diagnosed with stage IV lung cancer. One day he was a doctor treating the dying, and the next he was a patient struggling to live. And just like that, the future he and his wife had imagined evaporated.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Phenomenal book!
- By A. Potter on 01-16-16
By: Paul Kalanithi, and others
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American Baby
- A Mother, a Child, and the Shadow History of Adoption
- By: Gabrielle Glaser
- Narrated by: Kathe Mazur, Gabrielle Glaser, Margaret Katz
- Length: 10 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 212
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 176
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Story5 out of 5 stars 174
The adoption business was founded on secrecy and lies. American Baby lays out how a lucrative and exploitative industry removed children from their birth mothers and placed them with hopeful families, fabricating stories about infants' origins and destinations, then closing the door firmly between the parties forever. Adoption agencies and other organizations that purported to help pregnant women struck unethical deals with doctors and researchers for pseudoscientific "assessments," and shamed millions of women into surrendering their children.
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5 out of 5 stars
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I felt the love of my birth mom...
- By Mary H. on 02-03-21
By: Gabrielle Glaser
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The Hidden Habits of Genius
- Beyond Talent, IQ, and Grit - Unlocking the Secrets of Greatness
- By: Craig Wright
- Narrated by: Fred Sanders
- Length: 10 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 352
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 308
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 305
What is genius? The word evokes iconic figures like Einstein, Beethoven, Picasso, and Steve Jobs, whose cultural contributions have irreversibly shaped society. Yet Beethoven could not multiply. Picasso couldn’t pass a fourth grade math test. And Jobs left high school with a 2.65 GPA. The Hidden Habits of Genius explores the meaning of this contested term, and the unexpected motivations of those we have dubbed "genius" throughout history, from Charles Darwin and Marie Curie to Leonardo Da Vinci and Andy Warhol to Toni Morrison and Elon Musk.
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2 out of 5 stars
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Click-bait title, minimal substance inside
- By James S. on 11-27-20
By: Craig Wright
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Paranormal
- My Life in Pursuit of the Afterlife
- By: Raymond Moody MD, Paul Perry
- Narrated by: Tom Parks
- Length: 7 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 118
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 106
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 105
The grandfather of the NDE (near death experience) movement, Raymond Moody has, in the words of Dr. Larry Dossey, author of The Power of Premonitions, "radically changed the way modern humans think about the afterlife." Paranormal, essential listening for fans of Dannion Brinkley and Jeffrey Long, is "a thrilling and inspiring literary experience. Anyone who is not grateful for Moody's immense contribution to human welfare ought to check his pulse."
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5 out of 5 stars
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Engaging memoir of near-death researcher
- By tru britty on 03-20-20
By: Raymond Moody MD, and others
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Knocking on Heaven's Door
- The Path to a Better Way of Death
- By: Katy Butler
- Narrated by: Katy Butler
- Length: 10 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 157
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 142
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 138
Like so many of us, award-winning writer Katy Butler always assumed her aging parents would experience healthy, active retirements before dying peacefully at home. Then her father suffered a stroke that left him incapable of easily finishing a sentence or showering without assistance. Her mother was thrust into full-time caregiving, and Katy became one of the 24 million Americans who help care for aging parents. In an effort to correct a minor and non - life threatening heart arrhythmia, doctors outfitted her father with a pacemaker.
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2 out of 5 stars
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A better way to narrate a book about death?
- By MAUREEN on 10-21-13
By: Katy Butler
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Heart
- A History
- By: Sandeep Jauhar
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
- Length: 8 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 571
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 504
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 506
For centuries, the human heart seemed beyond our understanding: an inscrutable shuddering mass that was somehow the driver of emotion and the seat of the soul. As cardiologist and best-selling author Sandeep Jauhar tells in The Heart, it was only recently that we demolished age-old taboos and devised the transformative procedures that changed the way we live. Deftly alternating between historical episodes and his own work, Jauhar tells the colorful and little known story of the doctors who risked their careers and the patients who risked their lives to know and heal our most vital organ.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Fascinating Insight
- By Ironcharles on 10-27-18
By: Sandeep Jauhar
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What Do Women Want?
- Adventures in the Science of Female Desire
- By: Daniel Bergner
- Narrated by: Charles Pasternak
- Length: 6 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 476
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 407
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Story4 out of 5 stars 402
When it comes to sex, common wisdom holds that men roam while women crave closeness and commitment. But in this provocative, headline-making book, Daniel Bergner turns everything we thought we knew about women's arousal and desire inside out. Drawing on extensive research and interviews with renowned behavioral scientists, sexologists, psychologists, and everyday women, he forces us to reconsider long-held notions about female sexuality.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Masterfully read, depressing yet thoughtful book
- By Boom Depleter on 10-10-14
By: Daniel Bergner
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Advice for Future Corpses (and Those Who Love Them)
- A Practical Perspective on Death and Dying
- By: Sallie Tisdale
- Narrated by: Gabra Zackman
- Length: 7 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 193
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 166
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 165
You get ready to die the way you get ready for a trip. Start by realizing you don't know the way. Listen to a few travel guides. Study the language, look at maps, gather equipment. Let yourself imagine what it will be like. Pack your bags. This book is one of those travel guides - a guide to preparing for your own death and the deaths of people close to you. The fact of death is hard to believe. Sallie Tisdale explores our fears and all the ways death and talking about death make us uncomfortable - but she also explores its intimacies and joys.
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5 out of 5 stars
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I thought I had more time...
- By Alyssa on 09-09-19
By: Sallie Tisdale
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Changing the Way We Die
- Compassionate End-of-Life Care and the Hospice Movement
- By: Sheila Himmel, Fran Smith
- Narrated by: Coleen Marlo
- Length: 6 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 72
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 62
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 62
There’s a quiet revolution happening in the way we die. More than 1.5 million Americans a year die in hospice care - nearly 44 percent of all deaths - and a vast industry has sprung up to meet the growing demand. Once viewed as a New Age indulgence, hospice is now a $14 billion business and one of the most successful segments in health care. Changing the Way We Die, by award-winning journalists Fran Smith and Sheila Himmel, is the first book to take a broad, penetrating look at the hospice landscape.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Sadly, not very engaging.
- By Debra S. Long on 06-16-18
By: Sheila Himmel, and others
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The Family Gene
- A Mission to Turn My Deadly Inheritance into a Hopeful Future
- By: Joselin Linder
- Narrated by: Khristine Hvam
- Length: 7 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 29
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 24
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 25
When Joselin Linder was in her 20s, her legs started to swell. She thought little of it until her health problems started to compound in ways that baffled her doctors. Diagnosed with extreme liver blockage and dangerous levels of lymph fluid, Joselin turned to the most similar case she could think of - her father's.
By: Joselin Linder