Second Life

'Acutely empathetic, thoroughly researched, funny, irreverent and moving' Observer 'What a book!' Marianne Levy, author of Don't Forget to Scream 'I loved it' Lucy Jones, author of Matrescence In Second Life, Hess tells her deeply personal story of a pregnancy that falls outside the fêted category of 'normal'. But this is also a story about all of us. For as she made her way through a bizarre digital world of pregnancy apps, prenatal genetic tests, gender reveal videos, rare disease Facebook groups, 'freebirth' influencers and hospital reality shows, Hess realised that ideas of eugenics, surveillance, ableism and hyper-individualism are being sold through shiny technologies to a new generation of parents.