It's 2016 and Civil Townsend, now in retirement, feels compelled to share with her daughter, a piece of dark history in her life that took place in the early 1970s, when she took a job at a family planning clinic in Alabama…
Civil is fresh out of school, with big dreams for
…more her future, when she is introduced to her first patients- two young girls who are to receive birth control injections.
Civil is shocked by their near homeless living conditions, and by the age of the girls- one of which was only eleven years old and hadn't even started menstruating.
Believing she was doing the right thing, she intervenes on the family's behalf, pushing the boundaries of her job description.
But she also begins to question the healthcare decisions made on behalf of these girls and others like them, once again taking matters into her own hands.
This novel is based on shocking true events, where the government, through the guise of free healthcare, manipulated both the poor women the clinic catered to, as well as the healthcare professionals who thought they were doing the best thing for their patients.
Emotional, terrifying and powerful- this rich novel remembers shocking atrocities, but also serves as an eye-opening and poignant cautionary tale. A must read! (less)
