Canastota Public Library news
By Elizabeth Totten, public relations
(Canastota, NY – Aug. 2014) On Tuesday Aug. 12 at 6:30 p.m. Elizabeth Jarrett Andrew will be visiting the Canastota Public Library to talk about her newly released book, “Hannah, Delivered.”
“Hannah, Delivered” tells the story of how inexplicable passion, buried strength and professional skill deliver one woman from fear into a rich and fulfilled life.
Late one night in a busy St. Paul hospital, a nurse midwife drags Hannah Larson from behind her reception desk to assist with a birth. When Hannah witnesses the baby’s delivery, her secure and conventional life gets upended by a fierce desire to deliver babies.
So begins Hannah’s journey away from her comfort zone. In a midwifery apprenticeship in New Mexico, she befriends a male midwife, defends a teenage mom and learns to trust women’s bodies, then moves back to Minnesota to start her own illicit birth practice. Hannah’s need to stay safe proves both an asset and a liability: homebirth isn’t legal in Minnesota in the 1990s; to deliver healthy babies, Hannah risks jail time, her community’s respect and her career. The key to unlocking her fear rests in one birth—her own.
Andrew is a writing instructor and spiritual director living in Minneapolis. She is a recipient of a Minnesota State Arts Board artists’ fellowship, the Loft Career Initiative Grant, and a finalist for the Minnesota Book Award. She has written several spiritual memoirs. “Hannah, Delivered” is her first work of fiction.
The presentation is open to the public and will take place in the Lawson Community Room at the Canastota Public Library.