Monday, February 13, 2017

Patricia Harman's "The Runaway Midwife"

Patricia Harman, CNM, got her start as a lay midwife on rural communes and went on to become a nurse-midwife on the faculties of Ohio State University, Case Western Reserve University, and West Virginia University. She is the author of two acclaimed memoirs and the bestselling novel The Midwife of Hope River.

Here Harman dreamcasts an adaptation of her new novel, The Runaway Midwife:
Have you ever thought about running away, completely re-inventing yourself? You don’t really want to end it all; you just want the world to stop so you can get off. The stress has to be something terrible and overwhelming. I used to fantasize about escaping my life a lot and then I wrote a book about it.

In The Runaway Midwife, nurse-midwife, Clara Perry has had it. Her biology professor husband is screwing around. Her daughter, studying abroad in Australia, won’t answer her texts. Her best friend commits suicide without leaving a note and then as if things can’t get worse, one of her OB patients dies at a homebirth and Clara’s being blamed for it and accused of medical manslaughter.

Clara, is at the point where ordinary sensible solutions, things she would recommend to her patients, like going to a counselor, taking an antidepressant or divorce, seem as unhelpful as climbing Mount Everest with two broken legs.

So what does she do? The only thing a sensible, a down to earth, cautious person like Clara, would never do. She runs to a small island in Canada where she hopes she will never be found.

Jennifer Aniston would be perfect for the role because she’s funny and exudes the down to earth intelligence my protagonist has. She’s attractive in a natural sort of way, and, like my heroine, she could play crazy and reckless.

The supporting role of the cop on Seagull Island, who suspects something about Clara is off, goes to John Cusack. Good looking, but not overly so. Watchful. Restrained. Intelligent. And sexy if he wants to be.
Visit Patricia Harman's website.

The Page 69 Test: The Runaway Midwife.

--Marshal Zeringue