I can't remember where I first heard about The Farm by Joanne Ramos, but I checked it out from the library expecting a thriller. Golden Oaks, a luxury facility where surrogate mothers known as "Hosts" are paid to remain for the nine months of their pregnancies, seems too perfect to be true. There has to be a catch and I was expecting a shocking twist that never came.
Jane came to Golden Oaks after losing her job as a baby nurse. It seems like an answer to her financial problems, a way to provide a better life for her infant daughter who she's left in the care of her cousin. Although Jane is definitely being exploited at times she's her own worst enemy.
The hosts avoid stress and eat nutritious food an keep to a strict schedule of exercise. Their movements are constantly tracked, but there's really very little in the books about the details of surrogacy or of pregnancy and there's absolutely nothing about childbirth. There's a growing sense of just how vulnerable the Hosts are to the whims of their clients, and of Golden Oaks. It's horrific, but in a slowly paced, very realistic sort of way.
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