Longlist, 2023 Science Writers and Communicators of Canada Book Awards

A radical interrogation of the ethics and future of birth by an expert legal scholar.

Every single one of us has been born from a person. So far. But that is about to change. For the first time, babies could be gestated and born from machines through “Ex-vivo Uterine Environment Therapy,” aka EVE. But such radical technology leaves us with complex legal, social, and ethical questions. What does this breakthrough in artificial human gestation mean for motherhood, womanhood, and parenthood? Countries and people that do not respect the autonomy of pregnant people may use these technologies to curtail choice further, advance eugenic ideas, or to deepen class and racial divides.

In this fascinating story of modern birth, Claire Horn takes us on a journey from the first orchid-like incubators in the 1880s to the cutting-edge scientific breakthroughs of today. As she explores the most challenging and pertinent questions of our age, Horn reflects on her own pregnancy. Could artificial wombs allow women to redistribute the work of gestating? How do we protect reproductive and abortion rights? And who exactly gets access to this technology, in our vastly unequal world?

CLAIRE HORN is a Killam postdoctoral research fellow at Dalhousie University’s Health Law Institute. Her work over the last six years has focused on law and policy governing sexual and reproductive health, rights, and technologies. She has written for a variety of academic and nonfiction publications, including the Journal of Medical Ethics, the Medical Law Review, Feminist Legal Studies, Catalyst, Aeon, and Lady Science.

Claire Horn's profile page

• Long-listed, Science Writers and Communicators of Canada Book Awards

"An enlightening study on the ethics of medical reproductive assistance … Horn’s wide-ranging survey is a smart synthesis of many strands of politics and history." — Publishers Weekly

"Horn proposes a vision of reproductive equality that emphasizes a broader equality, less narrowly focused on reproduction." — The New Republic

"Eve is full of excellent research related in accessible language … A fascinating and fact-packed book." — Quill & Quire

"In her thoughtful debut, Eve, legal scholar Claire Horn examines the boundaries of motherhood through an unusual lens: artificial wombs ... a skilled writer with a careful grasp of her subject and its fascinating history – handled with poignancy because she was pregnant while writing the book." — Telegraph

“[Horn] tactfully navigates the polarized debate [around reproductive health care], and calls for the worldwide right to choose. [Eve has] an empathetic, sensitive touch beyond the philosophical.” — Literary Review of Canada

"Horn’s book … offers an engrossing insight into the future of birth through the lenses of the most pressing women’s health issues of our era." — New Statesman

"Eve ... looks with hope and trepidation to a future of externalised, artificial uteruses. Where do abortion, surrogacy and parenthood fit in a brave new ‘ectogenetic’ world?" — New Scientist, Books to Expand Your Mind